


Bowl of Stars

by islndgurl777



Category: Roswell New Mexico (TV 2019)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Ghost!Rosa stalks everyone during s1, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-05
Updated: 2019-10-17
Packaged: 2020-06-09 19:39:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 13
Words: 87,867
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19482646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/islndgurl777/pseuds/islndgurl777
Summary: Rosa’s been dead almost ten years now. While dead, she’s spent more time with her sister and father and secret family than she ever did while she was living. It’s funny, people say you don’t truly appreciate someone until they’re gone. Well, Rosa can attest to the fact that the opposite is true as well: you don’t truly appreciate your family until you’re dead and they can’t hear you teasing them about what a dumbass they’re acting like in front of their high school crush.





	1. Pilot

**Author's Note:**

> Work Title from Mrs. Potters Lullaby by Counting Crows.
> 
> The plan is to do a chapter a week for each episode for the discord rewatch, but I make no promises.

It’s been ten years since Liz Ortecho left Roswell after the death of her sister, Rosa. She’s been driving for hours back to a town that hates her family, so she’s not in the greatest mood when she gets stopped by the police at a checkpoint on her way into town. She sees a border patrol van on the side of the road and goes off on the officer who stops her.

“So you let the Joneses and the Jenners through, but you're gonna stop the Latina and tell me this is just a DWI checkpoint?” She’s furious, digging through her bag without turning to look at the officer.

“Ma’am,” he says, and his calm tone spurs her on more.

“I know Roswell is well past the hundred-mile border zone,  _ vato _ ,” she spits out, still digging in her bag.

“Ma’am,” the officer says again, this time sounding a little exasperated.

Liz is undeterred. “So I will have the ACLU so far up your ass, you'll be reciting the Tenth Circuit  _ Venzor-Castillo _ verdict in your sleep.” She finds her passport and holds it up in victory as she turns back to the window, and then all her venomous outrage dies out.

“Liz,” Max Evans says, face stunned.

“Max,” she replies, equally as stunned.

“Oooh, you’re in it now, Elizabeth,” Rosa sing-songs from the seat next to her.

/

Rosa’s been dead almost ten years now. While dead, she’s spent more time with her sister and father and secret family than she ever did while she was living. It’s funny, people say you don’t truly appreciate someone until they’re gone. Well, Rosa can attest to the fact that the opposite is true as well: you don’t truly appreciate your family until you’re dead and they can’t hear you teasing them about what a dumbass they’re acting like in front of their high school crush.

/

Rosa watches her sister’s awkward interaction with Max, cackling from the passenger seat. As they leave him behind and head into town, she leans over the center console, propping her head in her hand, and says, “I’ve seen you work other guys! What is it about Max Evans that turns you into a dumb kid again?”

Liz shakes her head, muttering under her breath about what an idiot she’d been as she pulls in behind the diner. “Rosa, you said he was in the rearview mirror, and for ten years he was. But there’s always been something about Max Evans,” she says, leaning forward to rest her head on the steering wheel.

“Yeah, well, it’s the same for him with you, Liz.” Her hand hovers just over Liz’s cheek, a wish left unfulfilled as her sister exits the car to head into the diner.

/

She’s there dancing with her sister when Max shows up to see her with the flimsy excuse of telling her about her running light being out. It’s pathetic, really, and she fake gags over how obvious they’re both being.

She’s there, standing between the two of them and teasing her sister for her terribly obvious flirting skills, when the shots ring out and take out the front window. She’s there when a bullet tears through her sister’s chest, and when she falls to the floor and starts bleeding out.

She’s there when Max Evans blows out every light in the restaurant to heal Liz and bring her back to life.

/

Rosa wants to stay with Liz, she does, but she knows her sister is going to be fine. Max, on the other hand, looks like he’s going to pass out even as he runs after the asshole who would have killed her sister.

The idiot savior collapses next to a dumpster, moaning and groaning , calling out to Isobel, from the sounds of it. She kneels down next to him, watching the street diligently, despite the fact that there’s nothing she could do to help him if someone were to try to hurt him right now. “Thank you,” she says softly, hands hovering near his arm; she wants to help him up or comfort him, but she can do neither.

Instead, she waits with him until Isobel shows up, panicking. “Max, oh my God, what? How did this happen?” she asks as she unscrews the cap of a bottle of nail polish remover.

Her coat flashes open and Rosa sees she’s wearing a sexy negligee, for playtime with her husband. She growls and steps back to start pacing next to them while Isobel continues to force acetone down Max’s throat.

/

Rosa’s been dead more than half as long as she was alive in the first place. A lot of that time she spent with her family, watching them move on and live their lives without her. Attending classes with her siblings got boring after a while; the sciences were not her forte, and despite having all the time in the world to learn, she was not enthusiastic about it. Ditto to spending a lot of time at her father’s diner. There’s only so many times you can listen to the same racist assholes order the same alien-themed meals before you lose what’s left of your dead mind. Double ditto to spending time at the sheriff’s station, or with anyone at the Caulfield prison. She might have been an addict and an alcoholic, but even she knew what they were doing there was wrong.

She didn’t want to spend every hour of every day with her family, so sometimes she chose to spend her undead time with her murderer. That’s how she recognizes Isobel’s attire.

/

She catches up with Liz as she’s having Kyle scan her for a head wound, or a bullet. 

“You won’t find either,” she sighs out, standing over Kyle’s shoulder as he looks over the scans. “Physically, she’s fine.”

Minutes later, Kyle shakes his head at Liz and says, “Physically, you’re fine.” Rosa throws her hands up behind him and starts pacing around them in a circle. “Do you want me to give you a recommendation for a counselor or therapist in town? Surviving a shooting can be--”

Liz shakes her head and waves her hand at him. “No, no, no. I’m fine. Or, I will be, after I get some sleep.” She lets out a shaky breath and shrugs, looking up at him with her eyebrows drawn together. “It’s just been...a really crappy night.”

He nods and rubs a hand down her arm, stepping closer to say softly, “I’m sorry that was your welcome home.”

Rosa shouts incoherently and steps between them, a hand hovering over each of their chests. “Oh my god, please don’t. I can’t watch my siblings kiss, it’s too twisted.”

They don’t kiss, but it’s too close for Rosa’s comfort. Instead, Liz heads home to get some sleep, and Rosa does a quick check in with other certain persons of interest.

/

Max is just getting home, stripping off his holster and uniform to fall face first into his bed. She notices his color is slightly better than it had been earlier and hopes a few hours’ rest will be enough to get him through the rest of the day.

Isobel is just arriving home as well, and fuming about something, but she pastes an almost convincing grin on her face to kiss Noah goodbye. He leaves for work and she heads upstairs to work in her home office.

Maria’s still sleeping, having spent a late night working at the bar most likely. Mimi’s sitting at the window, drinking a cup of tea and looking out at the mountains. She twitches just a little when Rosa nears her, but that’s it.

Her father is sitting on the edge of his bed, head buried in his hands. His shoulders shake and her heart aches for him. Tears spring to her eyes and dissolve into nothing before they can streak down her cheeks. She sits next to him until he’s steady enough to head downstairs for the lunch rush.

By that time, Michael’s in his trailer, pencil hovering over the schematics he’s currently working on, though he seems to be zoning out rather than doing any actual work. She hears something going on outside his trailer and, curious, she steps through his door into the midday sun.

There are several Air Force personnel packing up some vehicles outside, Jesse and Alex Manes among them, saving her two more trips before she loops back to Liz. Jesse’s focus is split between the trailer and Alex, his cold eyes shifting between the two with such malice Rosa shivers. She knows he’s got nothing concrete on Michael or the others, but she also knows his hate runs deeper than a family legacy.

Rosa moves toward Alex, eyes sweeping over him quickly. He seems okay, except for the slight clench of his jaw and the uncharacteristically cold look in his eyes. “Oh, honey,” she sighs, hands coming up to hover near his face. “You knew this wasn’t going to be easy.” Alex’s eyes flicker to the trailer just once before he climbs into one of the vehicles and they all drive away.

/

Liz bats her eyes and invokes Rosa’s name to scam a DNA sample from Max, and while she appreciates her sister’s acting abilities, she does not appreciate being called mentally ill. 

“What voices are you talking about, Liz? The only voices I ever heard were live, present ones, and you can definitely claim the same at this point!”

/

Sometimes it feels like Maria knows she’s there. She’ll move to make space for Rosa next to her at the bar, or her eyes will flicker over to her and away again just as quickly. Rosa knows she doesn’t know she’s doing it in the moment, but when she does notice, she never corrects herself. It’s like she’s aware there’s a reason she should be standing just so, and while she may not know what that reason is, she’s going with it. 

It’s almost enough to make Rosa feel alive again, feel seen. She stands with her hands hovering near each of their shoulders while her two best friends take shots to remember her.

/

Rosa goes home screaming when Liz and Kyle get into his car together. 

She lays out on her bed and stares at the ceiling. “What did I do to deserve this?”

/

Later, when Liz is pulling Max’s DNA from his straw and preparing the slide Rosa stands next to her desk and says sadly, “This is your last chance, Liz. You won’t be able to unswallow the red pill.”

She sighs when Liz looks down at the slide.

/

Rosa’s picked up most of the story over the years, through vague conversations overheard between the aliens and stalking the Project Shepherd bunker with Jim. But she’s never heard about how they were found and how they got separated. “Oh, Mikey,” she says quietly, passing a hand through one of the glowing pods.

Max says, “I know it sounds crazy.” And it might, if both Ortecho women weren’t intimately aware of what the aliens had the power to do.

Liz shakes her head a little. “I spent the last two days thinking that I needed to have myself committed.”

“I think you’re over-exaggerating a bit,” Rosa interjects, moving to another pod.

“This is...better than that,” Liz finishes.

“You say that now,” Rosa says at the last pod. “Just wait until you find out what happened to me.”

/

She leaves when Max places his hand over her sister’s heart because there are some moments even the dead shouldn’t witness.

/

Her brother is an idiot. 

“You’re such an idiot,” she yells at Kyle, hands clenched at her sides while Jesse Manes shows him around the Project Shepherd bunker. “You have no idea what he’s done, and you’re just going around endangering Liz’s life like this?”

“Everything I'm about to show you, Kyle, everything I tell you is fact,” Jesse says.

Rosa screams in frustrated rage, and she’s never wished more that she still had a corporeal form so she could strangle that man herself. 

/

Liz and Maria are out on the dance floor, jamming out to her song, while Max watches from the sidelines with such a lovelorn expression she thinks it should be trademarked. She sees Isobel clock him from the other side of the room and start making her way over.

Isobel sidles up next to him. “So you told her,” she says. Rosa can barely hear her from Max’s other side.

Max nods a little, a small smile on his face. “I did. She wasn't scared. She wasn't angry. She didn't run away. We can trust her.”

Rosa shrugs and says, “Unless she figures out what happened to me, and then you’re fucked my friend.”

Isobel scoffs and shakes her head. “So I’m guessing you didn’t tell her the truth about…”

Max cuts her off. “She can never know about that. She can never know what happened to Rosa.”

Rosa rolls her eyes and says, “You don’t even know the truth about what happened to me, so I wouldn’t be too concerned.”

Isobel leaves and Rosa follows her, glancing back to see Liz pull Max onto the dance floor. As they walk away from the center of the action, Isobel pulls her phone out of her dress pocket to check her texts. There’s just one, from Noah, which reads, “Running late. Meet you at the back door in ten? <3 <3 <3”

Isobel smiles and starts texting back. Rosa rolls her eyes and scoffs, folding her arms across her chest. “That asshole can run straight off a cliff,” she says. “I live for the day you find out what he’s done to you and follow through with that threat to melt a brain. Figuratively speaking,” she shrugs. She sighs and looks closely at Isobel’s face, heart hurting for the woman and all she’s gone through. With everything that’s happened in the last few days, it feels like that day might come sooner than she’d assumed. The secret’s finally out, and Rosa hopes that means justice will be served sooner rather than later.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Big thanks to tempest_nova for the beta/feedback as I'm still working out Rosa's voice!
> 
> I used transcripts.foreverdreaming.org for help with episode dialogue because I was unable to keep rewatching to get that down.


	2. So Much for the Afterglow

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> When they get to the Crashdown, Liz stands on the sidewalk outside and says, “Weirdly appropriate, getting driven home by a cop tonight of all nights. Rosa would be proud.”
> 
> Rosa snorts and says, “Two out of ten for general mischief-making--no one was hurt and nothing was destroyed--but nine out of ten for breaking the law, even though it was on a technicality.” She leans in and her hand hovers over Liz’s shoulder, almost patting her there. “I had to deduct a point because you didn’t actually get in trouble because the cop who picked you up has a crush on you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Many thanks to insidiousintent for help with this chapter!
> 
> I used transcripts.foreverdreaming.org for help with episode dialogue again.

Liz hasn’t gone to sleep yet. She keeps tossing and turning in her bed, looking at the clock on her phone, and huffing.

Rosa, who knows how she gets on this day, rolls her eyes and says, “You might as well get up, Liz. Find something useful to do until you’ve burned off some of this energy.”

Last year, Liz had been in Colorado and she’d taken a midnight stroll around several blocks before returning home and collapsing into bed, only to get up at six to head into her lab to work until after dark. She’d distracted herself with science, but she doesn’t have that option this year.

Finally, just minutes after midnight, Liz lets loose with a string of curses and throws off her blanket. “I have to go see her,” she says to the ceiling, and then she gets up and starts getting dressed.

Rosa shakes her head and says, “I’m always with you.”

/

The cemetery gates are locked for the night. Rosa steps through them and watches, amused, as Liz scrambles up and over the fence. “Graceful, Liz. I could have sworn I taught you better.” She watches Liz brush herself off as she glares up at the fence, then follows her to her own grave.

Max finds them a few minutes later, and Rosa gags loudly at how soft Liz’s voice gets when she says his name. He drives Liz home and Rosa hitches a ride in the back seat, grumbling a little. “I can’t believe I’m dead and I’m still forced into the back of a cruiser. Where’s the cosmic justice here?”

When they get to the Crashdown, Liz stands on the sidewalk outside and says, “Weirdly appropriate, getting driven home by a cop tonight of all nights. Rosa would be proud.”

Rosa snorts and says, “Two out of ten for general mischief-making--no one was hurt and nothing was destroyed--but nine out of ten for breaking the law, even though it was on a technicality.” She leans in and her hand hovers over Liz’s shoulder, almost patting her there. “I had to deduct a point because you didn’t actually get in trouble because the cop who picked you up has a crush on you.”

Liz and Max chat, exchanging awkward small talk while Rosa paces the sidewalk, eyes open for mischief-makers looking for a perfect score; the diner has traditionally been targeted on this day for a decade now, though she hopes the shooting last week prevents more destruction today. Her family doesn’t deserve it.

Liz turns around to head into the Crashdown and Max turns to his car, so Rosa tears her eyes away from the dark, but empty, street corners and heads to the door as well. 

“Hey,” Liz turns back and calls out to him; she looks nervous. “I still want to kiss you.”

Max looks surprised and Rosa can’t quite suppress her grin. “Don’t try to act all cool, mister. You’ve been waiting more than ten years for this.”

Liz continues, “I-I just… I got to get through this one really crappy day, but afterward, at sunrise.” They step closer to each other, though there’s still a considerable amount of space between them. “Meet me at the old turquoise mines?”

Max shakes his head a little and looks down. “I can’t, Liz. I told you.”

Rosa smiles and shakes her head as Liz interrupts him, “Look.” She pulls her shirt to the side to show him his mark. “The handprint's fading fast. It'll be gone by then. You'll know that my feelings are real, not just some sci-fi side effect.”

“It’s been ten years, Liz,” he deflects, though everyone in town probably knows how he feels about her, how he’s always felt about her. “You don't know me like you think you do.”

Liz laughs it off, but Rosa groans and buries her head in her hands. “He’s not wrong, Liz. There’s so much you don’t know. He’s a good guy, but getting involved with him could be dangerous.”

“It’s just a kiss, Max,” Liz tells him. “You don’t have to come, but I hope you do, and I think you will,” she says, and she walks back into the diner. 

Rosa sighs and watches the way he watches her until the door is locked and she’s heading safely upstairs. “I don’t know how I feel about this, Max,” she says to him. “On the one hand, you’re a great guy and you saved her life, but on the other hand, your brother-in-law is a psychotic serial killer and he’s so good at it you’ve had no clue for ten years.”

The lights go on upstairs and Max sighs and gets back into his car. “What am I supposed to do about that, Max?” she yells after him as he starts up the cruiser and heads down the street.

/

Liz falls asleep quickly, having used up some of her restless energy at the cemetery and flirting with Max. Their father was still asleep and had not even realized Liz had left. Rosa paces up and down the hallway between their rooms, listening for anything suspicious, so she’s the first one downstairs when Michael and Isobel show up to intimidate Liz.

Rosa crosses her arms over her chest and scowls at them. “Really? You guys are such assholes.”

Michael uses his telekinesis to lock them in and throw knives around, while Isobel uses the power of the internet to throw Liz’s ex in her face.

“You’re not intimidating her, you’re just being cruel,” Rosa says, standing across from Liz so they both bracket the door as Liz tries to usher them out.

Michael moves closer to Liz slowly, the threat building in his voice. Rosa rolls her eyes. “Stop it, Mikey. You can’t pull off scary.”

But Max can. He comes bursting through the door to shove Michael back, “Stay away from her!”

“ _ You _ stay away from her!” Michael yells back, and Max punches him.

“Oh my God!” Rosa yells, covering her mouth. “What the hell, Max?”

Max looks between Michael on the floor, and Isobel, off to the side, shock written on her face. “I come by to check on the diner, and you two are terrorizing her now? Hasn't her family been through enough?” he says.

“Yes!” Rosa yells, coming around to his side to glare up at him, fists bunched at her sides. “But that doesn’t mean you need to  _ hit Michael! _ ”

“By all means. Whatever it takes to protect  _ her family _ , Deputy,” Michael spits back at him.

Rosa turns to him. “Don’t you start! You did this to me just as much as he did!”

At the same time, Liz pushes between them and looks up at Max. “Hey, Max!”

“That's cute,” Michael says, looking between the two of them. He shoves past Max and out the door before they can say anything else.

Isobel starts to follow after him, then turns back to Max. “What, you're punching him now?” Max only looks a little remorseful and Isobel narrows her eyes at him “What is wrong with you?”

“I'm fine,” he says. 

“No, you’re not,” Isobel and Rosa say, and then Isobel takes off after Michael. 

Max turns back to Liz. “Is she right?” she asks, moving closer to look up at him. “Is something wrong?”

“No, I'm fine,” he says again, gently pulling her sweater up over her shoulder, breathing heavily. 

“Liar,” Rosa says, brow furrowed.

/

Her dad has checked the locks on all the downstairs doors three times this morning, all while cooking breakfast for himself and Liz. 

“No churro pancakes?” Rosa says lightly as she watches him assemble their food, closing her eyes and smiling when he starts singing along to the radio under his breath. “Dad, you have to start listening to music from this century.” She laughs as she imagines the incredulous look he’d shoot her. “I know! I know! You never thought you’d hear me say it, but some of the new stuff is pretty good!” She narrows her eyes at him, a smirk playing at her lips. “You might even like some of it, if you gave it a chance!”

He continues to sing quietly and she rolls her eyes, boosting herself to sit up on the counter next to him. She swipes her finger into the open can of green sauce and pouts when it comes away clean. “I do miss your cooking,  _ Papi _ ,” she says wistfully.

They both turn when they hear Liz bouncing down the stairs, and her dad calls out to ask her what kind of sauce she wants.

“Christmas. Why are we closed?” she asks as she comes out of the kitchen into the diner. “I was gonna help out.”

Her dad’s shoulders tense a little, but he continues to assemble breakfast as he says, “Every year, on the anniversary of Rosa's death, someone vandalizes us. After the shooting, I didn't want to risk an escalation; someone could get hurt.”

“Well, at least you’re finally being honest with her about what’s been happening,” Rosa says, poking her finger into Liz’s breakfast with a pout.

Liz narrows her eyes and says, “And what am I gonna do if the next person who gets hurt is you?” Their dad looks away, and Liz implores, “Dad. Come to California with me. You don't have to stay in this place where you're constantly reminded of the worst day of your life.”

He looks up, surprised. “You think  _ that's _ what I remember? The day we lost Rosa?  _ Mija _ , no,” he says gently when Liz looks away. “I remember your mother teaching Rosa to play guitar in that booth. The party for your  _ quinceañera _ …” His tone is fond, but Liz interrupts him.

“When Rosa got high and puked on Alex Manes' shoes,” she throws out, and Rosa’s breath hitches. She pulls back from her and scoots off the counter.

“Liz,” she says. “I--”

“Stop,” their dad commands, pulling away from Liz. “There was more to Rosa than the bad things that she did.  _ Era tu hermana _ . She loved you.”

“No, Dad. I loved  _ her _ .” Her voice is harsh, unforgiving.

Rosa lets out a small sound and lifts her hand to rub where her heart should be in her chest; it doesn’t beat, but it still hurts. “Lizzie,” she whispers, voice small.

Their dad blinks back tears and takes a moment to say, “You have to find a way to forgive her. If you don't, the ghosts will follow you, and you will never really get away.”

A harsh laugh bursts out of Rosa’s mouth and she shakes her head. “You have no idea,  _ Papi _ .”

“Try,” their dad implores Liz. “ _ Por favor, mija _ . For me.”

Liz’s eyes shine with tears, but her mouth is set in that stubborn Elizabeth Ortecho Does Not Give In stance. Rosa doesn’t think she can stand to hear her sister say she doesn’t want to find a way to forgive her, so she leaves.

/

She drops by Max’s first. There’s something going on with him and she’s concerned about his extreme response to Michael earlier. It wasn’t a normal reaction for him, even if it was about protecting Liz. Max is sleeping though, so she won’t be able to figure out what’s going on with him until later at the earliest.

Michael’s up next, as the other half of the problematic duo of the day, and she shows up outside his trailer just as he’s saying to Alex, “Why don’t you tell Uncle Sam I’ll think about it.” His tone is low, sexy, and he’s pulling Alex in by the edge of his shirt.

“What the fuck did I just walk into?” Rosa says, eyeing the nearly nonexistent space between them.

Alex lifts his hand to Michael’s wrist and grips it, firmly but gently tugging his hand away as he says, “Guerin. What happened at the reunion cannot happen again.”

Rosa’s eyes widen and she says, “Whoa, what happened at the reunion?” Michael looks down and sighs as he pulls away from Alex, his whole body relaxing into the most obviously fake cocky swagger she’s ever seen in her life. “Uh oh,” she says, having copped to his defensive moves years ago. “Don’t do it.”

He does it. “What happened?” he asks. “I was pretty wasted.” His matter-of-fact tone and small shrug tell her he remembers it perfectly.

Alex shakes his head; he knows Michael’s moves too, but he doesn’t call him on it like Rosa would. Instead, he reminds Michael he needs to move his trailer and moves to leave. Michael, giant dope that he is, grasps for any way to keep Alex around longer and strikes up a conversation about why the Air Force is buying the ranch.

“Oh my God, Michael. I left you alone for five minutes the other night; what did you two do to resort to this--” she waves between them to indicate what she’s talking about. “--weird, stilted smalltalk?” She stomps her foot, frustrated, and because she can’t be around people who are foolishly wasting their lives right now, she leaves again.

/

Isobel’s kissing Noah goodbye, and their flirty banter is just too much for her to handle, so she’s gone almost as quickly as she arrived.

Kyle’s eating a late breakfast before he goes in to work, reading over an actual physical newspaper as he eats. She rolls her eyes at what an old man he is, passes her hand just over his head, and heads over to the Wild Pony.

Maria’s setting up for the evening’s entertainment, a 90’s night she’s put on every year on this date for the last nine years. She finishes pulling the chairs off tables and looks over when Mimi wanders into the empty bar from upstairs. Maria smiles at her and gestures her over to wait at the bar. She picks up her iPod and scrolls through a litany of songs, frowning for a long time before she picks one and it starts playing around the bar.

Rosa closes her eyes and smiles, swaying along with the DeLucas, and Mimi leans over to grip Maria’s hand tightly. “She loves this one,” she says.

“Yeah,” Maria croaks, clearing her throat and smiling. “She does.”

/

By the time she’s ready to see Liz again, her sister is at church, and Max has his hand in her shirt. 

“Elizabeth!” she shrieks, holding up her hands to block her view, while looking around for some scandalized churchgoers. Thankfully, there’s no one else there. “What are you doing corrupting  _ Max _ , in a  _ church _ ?”

She looks back when Max says, “No, no,” and starts pulling his hand away.

Liz, eyes closed, tears streaming down her cheeks, gasps out, “Wait, please,” and pulls his hand back.

“What’s going on?” Rosa asks, but of course they don’t respond. Both of their eyes are closed; Max looks like he’s in pain, and Liz is crying, but she looks happy.

They pull apart a moment later and Liz hugs him. He tucks his face into her shoulder a little bit and closes his eyes, a pained bliss in them Rosa doesn't understand.

Liz pulls away, tears streaming down her face. “Thank you,” she says. “Thank you.”

Rosa’s eyes widen as they lean in like they’re going to kiss. “What the fuck is going on?”

At the same moment, Max’s hot partner pipes up on his walkie, interrupting the moment, and Max leaves, telling Liz he’ll see her in the morning.

Liz leans back and breathes shakily, hands trembling where she’s placed them over her heart, and Rosa drops onto the pew next to her saying, “Why do I keep missing all the good stuff?”

/

It turns out that staying out all night trespassing in a graveyard, then being accosted in your own home by two well-meaning-but-still-jerks aliens during the witching hour, and watching old memories of your dead sister via a psychic alien connection through your crush...well, all of that can exhaust a living person, so Liz goes home to take a nap.

Rosa checks on her father one last time, then arrives at another secret cave, just as she has for the last eight years on this day since she found out what really happened to her.

Noah’s already there, kneeling in front of her pod, shoulders shaking. She steps closer, eyeing the candles he lit around the cave, watching the flames flicker over the tear tracks on his face. “You’re pathetic,” she says quietly, wandering around to see what changes he’s made to her altar since the last time she could stomach to be in here.

His breath hitches and she glances over her shoulder to see more tears streaming down his face. “Weeping over the loss of a woman who never even loved you. The woman you killed.” Her voice is low, shaking with her rage.

His breathing shudders again and he lets out a low wail. She whips around and stalks over to him. “You have no right!” she yells, circling him and pointing accusingly. “No right to cry for me after what you did!”

“I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m so sorry, Rosa. I’m so sorry,” he sobs again.

It’s a familiar refrain; each year he comes here to cry over her and beg her forgiveness. Each year she stands over his weeping form and damns him for what he’s done, vowing to haunt him until he’s paid for what he’s done.

“You killed me, and you’ve killed others, and you  _ used Isobel _ and then tricked her into marrying you!” She balls her hands into fists and raises them above her head. “You are a despicable person!” She brings her arms down together, fists aimed for his vulnerable neck, but they pass right through him. “I hate you!”

Her breath hitches and she dry-sobs for several minutes, bringing her fists up and trying her hardest to make them connect with his flesh over and over again until she screams in frustration.

She finally collapses back against her pod, sitting on the ground in front of him. Her eyes are red, filled with tears that will never fall, and she watches, disgust curling her lips, as he pulls himself together. He cleans himself up with the wipes and box of tissues Isobel normally stores under the back seat of his car, takes a long drink of the acetone he keeps on hand in the cave.

It’s incredible; he’d been weeping at her feet minutes earlier, and now the only evidence is a slight redness around his eyes, which will be gone by the time Isobel sees him again. Rosa stands in front of him, looking up into his face while he takes one last look at her charred corpse in her pod. “You’re disgusting,” she sneers at him, and despite wanting Liz to stay far away from him, she can’t help but hope her sister figures out the truth so this is the last year she has to watch her murderer weeping over her body in some twisted parody of remorse.

/

She takes some time--not to breathe, because she’s dead, but to calm down--before she tracks down Liz at the Wild Pony. Maria’s decked out, looking gorgeous in her 90’s best behind the bar, teasing Liz about Max.

Rosa sidles up to Maria and she shifts slightly to unknowingly accommodate her, looking down at the paper Liz is doodling on. Rosa looks down too and her breath catches. “What?”

Maria asks Liz where she remembered the lyrics from, and Liz says she had a memory of it written on Rosa’s hand, but that can’t be right.

“How…? You didn’t see me that night,” Rosa says, eyes fixed on the paper. She looks down at her hand and sees the same lyrics permanently fixed upon her spectral skin.

Maria stiffens a little and explains the same to Liz, and tells her she’d done it the night of the accident.

Rosa sighs as she realizes, “Max. I saw him that night before I went out to the cave. Why would he have shown you  _ that _ memory though?”

Liz looks devastated and pulls back from Maria. “What? Are you sure?”

Maria’s eyes glisten with tears. “Yeah, I’m sure.”

Liz’s phone rings, jolting them all out of their memories, and she looks down to see who it is. “Maria, I’m sorry, but I have to take this. Thank you for doing this for Rosa,” she says, gesturing around the bar.

Maria nods and gives a small smile. “No thanks necessary, Liz. I’ll see you later?”

Liz nods and answers the phone as she heads out of the bar. Rosa takes one last long look around and turns to Maria. “I miss you.”

Maria breathes out, a controlled exhale, and whispers, “I miss you, Rosa.”

Rosa smiles and follows after Liz.

/

Liz is a woman on a mission, and she practically blasts through the waiting room of the hospital to track down Kyle.

She calms down slightly when they do find him, but she’s back to mission mode as she looks through Rosa’s fake autopsy, breath hitching and eyes full of tears. Kyle watches her closely, ready to comfort her, maybe, or talk her through it.

“I wasn’t high,” Rosa tells them, arms crossed over her chest. “I’m not saying I was completely sober, but I was  _ not _ high that night.”

And then Kyle recalls something she’s surprised he’d even bother remembering. “Remember when we were kids and I was at your house when Rosa was rushed to the ER because her appendix burst? This marks her appendix as present.”

Rosa inhales sharply, eyes travelling between her two siblings. She can’t believe Manes’ fake autopsy contains such a glaring error.

“Crappy medical examiner?” Liz suggests, but her tone says she’s skeptical of that explanation.

“Or a fake autopsy,” Kyle says, tone sure.

Rosa smiles because her brother is so damn smart.

He pulls out another folder and continues, “I did some digging and I found the real one, but…”

Liz snatches it out of his hand, and Rosa steps forward, hand outstretched, “Liz, wait!” But she’s already opening the file.

“Rosa,” she says, and now the tears fall.

Rosa doesn’t look at the file; she knows very well what she looks like in the photographs, but she hadn’t wanted her sister to have to see them. Or her brother for that matter.

Kyle looks pained, and Rosa loves him for mourning her, even though he didn’t know they were siblings. “Your sister's death wasn't an accident, Liz. And I know how crazy this sounds, but... I think she was murdered…” Liz finally looks away from the photos and up to him for an explanation. “By an alien,” he finishes.

The room is silent while they all process what he’s said, until Rosa breaks it with, “Well, you’re not wrong.” Her eyes flicker over to Liz. “But it’s not who you think, Liz, and I know you can feel that in your heart.”

Kyle steps closer to Liz, his voice soft and urgent when he says, “Liz, I saw the handprint on your chest the other night. I need to know who put it there.”

“Not if you’re going to turn him in to Jesse Manes, you don’t,” Rosa says, shifting to stand behind Liz, her hands hovering at her sister’s shoulders.

Liz is crying, eyes roaming over the autopsy photos, and she whispers, “He saw her. He saw her that night.”

Rosa stomps her foot and says, “Yes, but it’s not what you think!”

“Who? Liz?” Kyle questions, tone firm, moving closer as Liz scoots away, from the autopsy and from him.

“I have to go,” she says, turning around and taking off before Kyle can stop her.

He turns back to the photographs and lets out a long sigh. Rosa pauses halfway to the door, ready to follow Liz, but needing to make sure Kyle’s okay too.

Kyle runs gentle fingers over the photos and carefully sets them to rights in the file. He places the real report back into his bag and straightens the fake one to return to the coroner’s office. He stands in the middle of his office, looking down at the front of the fake file with a grim look on his face. “I’m sorry, Rosa,” he says quietly. 

She steps back to place her hand next to his cheek. “Don’t worry about it, Kyle. Liz isn’t done yet.”

/

She catches up with Liz on her way back home, and they find their father beaten to hell in the diner. He tells Liz it was Wyatt Long, that asshole, and that Max arrested him for it.

He also tells Liz that Max is a good kid, and that he’s been coming in for years to not drink their coffee and to ask about Liz. Rosa has to suppress her smile at their dad’s not-so-subtle matchmaking attempt and Liz’s look of utter confusion over Max’s character.

“You don’t need to feel this conflicted, Liz,” Rosa says. “Your heart knows exactly who Max Evans is, you’re just not listening.”

/

Rosa had not been planning on going to the mines with Liz, but now that Liz knows Rosa was killed by an alien and that she thinks it was Max, Rosa feels she has to. Even if Liz confronts Max, there’s no way he’d hurt her, so she’s not worried about that, but she also feels she should be there to witness the fallout of that conversation.

It’s a form of self-torture, intentionally listening in on a confrontation she could easily neutralize if only she were  _ alive _ . Then again, her death is the reason for the confrontation in the first place.

She sighs when Liz chickens out of the kiss with Max, then rolls her eyes when she decides to come at his involvement in Rosa’s death from the side rather than confront him directly.

“You know him Liz. You know in your heart he didn’t do this to me!” she says, standing between them on the hill outside his cave.

Liz offers her help in fixing whatever’s been wrong with Max since he healed her, and as much as Rosa knows he needs the help, she doesn’t want Liz helping him with ulterior motives. Max hesitates because he doesn’t want to be experimented on, and Rosa has to side with him on this one, only because she knows Liz is doing it for the wrong reasons.

“We could get to know each other,” Liz tells him, looking up and seducing him with those big brown eyes, and he falls for it, hook, line, and sinker.

Rosa groans and rubs her hands on her face. “This is not going to end well.”

/

When Liz leaves Max, she goes back to Rosa’s grave, and Kyle meets her there. 

He berates her for running off to confront Rosa’s killer on her own, to which Rosa yells, “He’s not my killer!” though of course, neither of them hear that.

“I'm gonna find out who killed my sister, and I am gonna bring them to justice,” Liz says with conviction. 

“That’s fine!” Rosa says, throwing her hands up. “That’s great, please do! I’ve only been waiting ten years for  _ anyone _ to find out the truth!”

“I'm gonna fight like hell,” Liz continues. “Even if it was Max Evans.”

Rosa chokes on her words and her eyes dart to Kyle, whose eyes have gone wide. Liz looks over at him and raises a brow.

“Max Evans?” he says, voice high with doubt.

Liz nods and turns to face him fully. Rosa lets out a low whistle and says, “I can’t believe you told him.”

“ _ Deputy _ Max Evans, who regularly reroutes traffic to safely let tortoises cross the road? That Max Evans?”

Rosa grins at the doubt in his voice and places her hands on her hips as she turns back to Liz. “That Max Evans?” she repeats. “Listen to my brother, Elizabeth.”

Liz nods. “Max Evans who channelled enough energy to dissolve a bullet out of my body and bring me back from the edge of death.”

Kyle startles and sucks in a breath. “What?” Rosa moves to ghost her hand over his arm in comfort.

Liz’s lips twist and she shakes her head. “If he could do that, what’s to say it couldn’t work the opposite way?”

Kyle breathes deep and looks her in the eye. “You seriously think he would kill your sister?”

Liz hesitates only a moment before she nods once and says, “I think I’m going to find out.”


	3. Tearin' Up My Heart

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I'm trying to help, Max,” Liz tells him, as if she has no ulterior motives. “You said yourself you've felt sick ever since you healed me. It's not like you can go to a GP. I'm your best bet.”
> 
> All of these are true statements; Rosa has seen for herself the change that has come upon Max since he healed Liz, and she’s spent a lot of time with him over the years. There is something wrong with him, and Liz is his best bet at figuring out what it may be, but Rosa wants him to get better for his own sake. Liz’s motives are far from pure. “Don’t make him regret trusting you, Elizabeth,” she murmurs, watching her sister uneasily.

Liz has always been a logical thinker. She’s never led with her heart that Rosa can remember, at least not since the first time their mother took off without a word and didn’t come back for a month. Liz likes to be in control. She was like that all through school, and she’s even like that now. She collects all the facts and analyzes them to death to come to the most logical conclusions, disregarding her own personal feelings in the process.

Only, now she has to reconcile the newfound facts surrounding Rosa’s death with the logical conclusion that Max had something to do with it, and Rosa doesn’t think she’s handling it well.

Rosa watches from her bed as Liz looks over the clinical pictures from her autopsy, the full, unedited report of her injuries, the candid photographs of the two of them from high school, and the picture of herself and Max in the yearbook.

“I don’t think  _ those _ pictures are going to help you with your investigation, Liz,” she says, voice a little sad, and watches as Liz carefully collects everything so their dad doesn’t find it. “But if you’re determined to do this, I’m glad you’re reminiscing about the boy you’ve always known. It will help you realize not everything is what it seems.”

Of course, Liz doesn’t respond; she finishes packing up her lab kit and leaves for Max’s to start her investigation in earnest.

/

Rosa loves her sister more than anyone in the world. They were each others’ first friends, and she watched over her when they were young. When their mother left that last time, Rosa held Liz while she cried, then tracked Helena down and warned her to stay away so she’d stop breaking Liz’s heart. Even after she died, Rosa spent a lot of her time watching over her sister, observing and providing unheard commentary about every person that came into her life and sitting by her side when things fell apart and Liz had no one else.

Rosa loves her sister with all of her unbeating heart, but she feels a lot of secondhand shame at the underhanded way Liz flirts with Max to get the answers she’s looking for.

“I'm trying to help, Max,” Liz tells him, as if she has no ulterior motives. “You said yourself you've felt sick ever since you healed me. It's not like you can go to a GP. I'm your best bet.”

All of these are true statements; Rosa has seen for herself the change that has come upon Max since he healed Liz, and she’s spent a lot of time with him over the years. There is something wrong with him, and Liz  _ is _ his best bet at figuring out what it may be, but Rosa wants him to get better for his own sake. Liz’s motives are far from pure. “Don’t make him regret trusting you, Elizabeth,” she murmurs, watching her sister uneasily.

Liz directs him to take off his shirt, and Rosa watches as she takes an extra second to tear her eyes from Max’s chest. The discomfort in Rosa’s chest eases, because her sister is not as unaffected by Max as she appears to be. That attraction, that fondness she feels for him, will hopefully be enough to help Liz come to terms with the truth, whenever the pieces start coming out.

“You don't have to be scared of me,” Liz tells him softly, hands gently touching his chest.

“I’m not,” Max says, because he doesn’t know he has a reason to be, and with the heavy eye contact they’re exchanging, Rosa doesn’t think he has a reason to be either.

“Your heart’s racing,” Liz says.

“It’s not racing ‘cause I’m scared of you,” he tells her, earnest.

“ _ Dios mio _ , I’ve never met a man who is so open with his feelings. It’s kind of nauseating,” Rosa says, watching the way he gazes adoringly into her eyes. Liz’s eyes slip down to his lips, and Rosa’s eyebrows rise. “Really? After you spent all morning muttering ‘the observations of the case’ under your breath? You’ve got it bad, Liz.” She rolls her eyes when they awkwardly move away from each other, creating a barrier of space between them. “I can’t watch this anymore, it’s too pathetic,” she says, leaving to find her brother.

/

She finds Kyle taking his morning jog. “Ugh,” she says, running to keep up with him. “I know I don’t get winded or cramps or anything like that, but jogging is still the worst,” she tells him. “I don’t know why you feel the need to do it every day.”

He slows down as they near some buildings, and that’s when Rosa realizes where they are and sees who they’re meeting. 

She skids to a halt as he walks up to Jesse Manes and she glares at his back. “Tell me you didn’t!”

Jesse greets him and Kyle tells him he has 30 seconds to say what he needs to say. His tone and the casual way he says it sets Rosa a little at ease. Kyle somehow knows this man is not to be respected or trusted.

“You said your patient, the one with the handprint, is still alive,” Manes says, watching Kyle carefully.

Kyle nods. “Very much so.” He tilts his head and says derisively, “Is it possible that maybe aliens aren’t the enemy of humanity?”

Rosa does a little dance and yells, “Yes! Thank you!” She kisses the air above his cheek with a wide grin.

Manes demands more information from Kyle because he’d given him the real file on Rosa’s autopsy, but Kyle deflects. “Can’t one of your kids be your alien hunting buddy? You have four war hero sons.”

Rosa rolls her eyes. “Listen, don’t even get me started on the other Manes boys. They are in way over their heads with their father and this operation.”

“This is not for the faint of heart,” Manes tells him, avoiding eye contact.

Kyle’s head rears back a little. “Are you calling  _ Alex _ faint of heart? This entire town threw him a parade when he came home from Iraq.”

Rosa smiles at Kyle’s disgusted look. “Good to see you’re back to defending him from assholes. He could use a friend like you,” she says, wrapping her arm to hover around his back in a half-hug.

Her smile drops when she hears Manes threatening her brother and his friends. She shivers and keeps her incorporeal body between Kyle and Manes as he steps around her brother; she knows what this monster is capable of. She juts her chin out and snarls, “You stay away from him, or so help me, I will find a way to kill you myself.”

She can hear Kyle take a shaky breath behind her before he says, “I’m not going to tell you where I saw the handprint.”

Pride and fear fill her as Manes turns back around. “That’s okay. That’s not what I want from you anyway. I need access to your father’s research material.”

“What?” Rosa says, not daring to take her eyes away from Manes to see what her brother thinks of this. “You have copies of everything from Caulfield already. What is it you think Kyle has?”

Kyle takes another thirty seconds to regulate his breathing after Manes enters the bunker, then with an uneasy glance at the bunker door, he starts back to his apartment. Rosa keeps pace with him the entire way, eyes constantly scanning the road and buildings around them for danger.

She sits out on his couch and watches the front door while he takes a shower, then paces his bedroom as he gets ready for the day. “What are you going to do?” she asks, twisting her hands in front of herself.

Kyle inhales deeply and sits down on his bed, elbows on his knees and his head in his hands. “This is so fucked up,” he mumbles to himself.

Rosa lets out a low noise and sits next to him, hand hovering over his back. “It’ll be okay.”

He groans and lifts his head, eyes bouncing around his room until they land on his closet. “The only thing I can think of would be…” He stands and makes his way over, turning on the light and scanning over the boxes on the shelf above. He pulls down the one labelled “Dad”, and sets it on his bed. 

Rosa kneels next to him on the bed, watching as he opens it and starts pulling things out. There are pictures and postcards and small keepsakes, but nothing she recognizes as Project Shepherd research material. From Kyle’s frustrated noises, he doesn’t think there’s anything here either. He runs his fingers through his hair and says, “But I don’t know where else they’d be? There’s nothing left at Mom’s…”

Rosa tilts her head and shakes it. “What do you mean? What are you looking for?”

His eyebrows go up and his eyes clear. “Oh!”

Rosa’s eyebrows furrow and she scoots closer to him. “What ‘oh’? Can you please talk out loud to yourself like a normal person so I can keep up with you?” Her hands hover at his shoulders, desperate to shake him.

Before she can get too frustrated, his phone rings with Liz’s tone and he shakes himself out of his revelation. “Hello?” He looks concerned as he picks up his keys and starts heading for the door. “I’m on my way.”

/

Rosa beats Kyle up to Liz--one of the perks of being a ghost, she supposes--and lets out a loud, “Fuck,” when she sees the burn on Liz’s arm.

Liz is holding it slightly away from her body, looking down on it as if she’s inspecting something under a microscope, and Rosa’s hands hover over it as she looks it over as well. “What the hell happened?”

Kyle slips in just then and freezes when he sees her arm. “Fuck.” He drags a chair over and sits down across from her, dropping his bag on the floor next to him. “What the hell happened?” He holds out his hands, waiting for Liz to nod her permission before he gently pulls her arm closer so he can look it over. Rosa hovers next to him, eyes running over the burn.

Liz rolls her eyes and says, “It was an accident.”

Rosa laughs humorlessly and shakes her head. “Liz.” Max would never deliberately hurt Liz, but he’s been acting odd, and according to some of the stories from high school, he doesn’t have his powers on 100% lockdown when it comes to her.

Kyle looks up at Liz, eyebrows raised, and says, “Do you know how many domestic abuse survivors have told me the same thing?” He reaches into his bag for something to clean her arm with.

She rolls her eyes again and says, “No, but it was. Actually, it was kind of my fault.”

Rosa’s eyes tear up and she lets out a single choked sob. How many times had Alex fed them that line growing up? She shakes her head and covers her face with her hands; she wants Liz to find out the truth, for everyone’s sake, but she definitely doesn’t want Liz hurt in the process. Especially by Max.

Kyle pauses and looks up at her, shrugging in disbelief. “Seriously?” He pulls out a wrap and starts carefully covering ther burn.

Liz presses her lips together and lets out a huff. “I trusted you. Promise me you won’t tell anyone what I told you.”

Kyle shakes his head. “I know you want to believe Max is a golden retriever, but he’s a friggin’ X-file, Liz. This proves it,” he says, gesturing down to her burn.

Liz shrugs it off. “It’s a superficial injury.”

Kyle nods. “Yeah, well, that’s not,” he says, gesturing to the burned and broken machine Liz had taken to Max’s that morning. “You and I both know this level of energy output could be lethal. I really think we should turn him in.”

Rosa sucks in a breath even as Liz sarcastically suggests they turn him in to the cops, then jumps up and hovers over Kyle when he suggests the government. “No! You know that’s not the right answer! You know Jesse Manes cannot be trusted!”

Liz points out how ridiculous that idea is, and he nods to acknowledge it too. Rosa lets out a slow breath and steps away from him. 

“I never liked him,” he says softly. “Always staring at you like he was observing an alien life form.” He looks up at her, his thumb stroking gently over her bandage.

“Oh God,” Rosa says, but Liz isn’t even looking at him anymore; she’s looking over at Rosa’s bookshelf, the light of an idea in her eyes. Rosa steps closer to look for what may have caught her attention.

“Max Evans is only half the story. Look, I had to provoke Max for this to happen,” Liz says, holding her arm out. “So what could Rosa have done to provoke him?”

“What do you mean, you provoked him? What did you  _ do _ , Elizabeth?” Rosa says, eyes snapping back to her.

Liz stands and makes her way to the bookshelf, telling Kyle about how Rosa liked to hide things and keep secrets, showing him her heart symbol and opening up the book. She sighs as she pulls out a baggie of pills. “Typical.”

Rosa doesn’t have a body, or a heart, so she shouldn’t feel it breaking when she hears the disappointment in her sister’s voice. “I was an addict, Liz, what did you expect?” she says, stepping back and crossing her arms over her chest.

“Murder invesitgations have clues,” Liz says to Kyle. “I want a clue.”

Rosa lets out a shaky breath and shrugs. “I guess that’s fair. And you might find something around here. I can’t remember if I kept anything Noah gave to me, but if I did, there’s only so many places it would be.”

/

Liz is heading to the Wild Pony, so Rosa does a quick check in with her dad (holed up in his office, balancing the books, boring) then goes to check in on Mimi while she waits for Liz to show up. 

Mimi’s in the kitchen of their apartment, leaning on the counter and reading a magazine as she waits for the kettle to heat. Rosa sits on the counter next to her and looks down at the fashion spread on the page. “I don’t think that’s you at all, Mimi,” she says, scrunching up her nose and shaking her head.

Mimi huffs and shakes her head, flipping to the next page. Rosa takes a minute to consider, then her finger hovers over a picture and she says, “This jacket, on the other hand? Very you.”

Mimi hums and drags her pointer finger down the picture. “I like this jacket,” she says quietly. She hums again, then tears the page from the magazine and hangs it on the fridge with a pink magnet.

Rosa smiles and says, “Catch you later, Mimi!” before she heads downstairs to wait for Liz with Maria.

/

Maria is unequivocally the best person Rosa knows. The woman put her own dreams aside to stay in Roswell and take care of her mother. She fought hard to keep in contact with Alex while he was deployed, even when he tried his hardest to push her away. She defied their entire town to celebrate Rosa’s life even while thinking she’d killed those girls. Hell, she even rolled her eyes and let Michael come back to the Pony week after week, even when he’d start fights and bail on his bar tab. The woman is practically a saint.

She has also been the peacemaker between the two Ortecho sisters ever since they met her. When Liz points out that all of the tracks on Rosa’s CD are probably clues, she smiles sadly and says, “I didn't want to invade her privacy.” She takes the CD from Liz and raises her eyebrows pointedly. “Even now.”

Rosa laughs and smiles at her. “Thank you, Maria, but dead women don’t have any privacy.”

Liz asserts that it’s her prerogative to dig into her older sister’s business and looks to the next clue. “ ‘Under the Bridge.’ You coming?” she asks Maria, a spark in her eyes.

Maria hesitates only a moment before she nods and says, “Yeah.”

Rosa shrugs and follows them out to the car. Maria is  _ practically _ a saint, not  _ totally  _ a saint.

/

While they head to the bridge, Rosa decides to do a quick check in with Michael, and she finds him with Isobel. They’re eating bagels and drinking coffee in one of the open garages at Sanders’.

Isobel raises an eyebrow at him and says, “Is there a reason we can’t eat at your table?”

Michael shrugs and takes a large bite of his bagel. Uh oh, that’s a classic Michael Guerin Avoidance Tactic. Rosa steps away from them so she has a clear eye line to the Airstream.

Isobel hums and looks him over. “Is it the same reason you’re shirtless and sporting a hickey on your stomach?”

Michael looks down, embarrassed, and shrugs again. Double uh oh, he’s not telling Isobel what’s going on when she presses.

Isobel sucks in a breath, and Rosa can see the low-level rage in her eyes. “Seriously?”

Michael looks up, cheeks still flushed. “Is, just don’t, please,” he says softly, shaking his head.

Rosa can’t quite repress the wounded noise she makes on his behalf at the sad look in his eyes. Isobel purses her lips and shakes her head, arms crossed over her chest. “How long do we need to wait here?”

Michael lets out a long breath and shrugs, shaking his head. “Not much longer, I’d guess. He’s eager to not get caught.”

“Michael--”

“Is, please,” he says again, voice tired.

She meets his eyes and gives a short nod, and they go back to their breakfast.

Sure enough, less than a minute later, Alex exits the Airstream, careful to close the door as quietly as he can on his way out. It still squeaks a little, and he winces at the sound. Though Isobel and Michael are far enough under the garage that they can’t see him, Michael’s lips twist in a grimace and Isobel’s turn white she presses them together so hard.

Rosa leaves them to follow Alex, whose car is parked behind one of the old vans in the yard. Hidden away so no one would know he was there. “What did you say to him?” she asks, bewildered. “I thought you were ready, I thought you wanted this?”

He gets into his car and puts the keys in the ignition, but he doesn’t start it. He stares down at the steering wheel and breathes hard. “Fuck,” he says under his breath, closing his eyes, eyebrows scrunching up on his forehead. “Fuck,” he says again, slamming his hands on the edges of the steering wheel. He lets out a few slow breaths, then opens his eyes with a nod. “Okay. Okay.”

He starts his car and leaves. “Are you guys seriously doing this again?” Rosa calls after him, throwing her arms up in frustration.

/

She catches up with Liz and Maria as they arrive at the bridge.

“I’m just trying to fill in the gaps of who my sister really was,” Liz says.

Rosa sighs and leads them through the grass and weeds, eyes on her secret hiding place. “I was nineteen years old, Liz. I didn’t even know who I really was.”

“You already know that,” Maria tells her. “She was electric. Impulsive. She was a ‘hold your hair back when you’re sick, slash your ex’s tires’ type of friend.” Rosa smiles along with Maria as she continues with, “She was a total flake. Completely unreliable.” Rosa scowls over at her, but ultimately has to nod in agreement. Maria continues as they make their way under the bridge, “But, somehow, when you needed her most, she always seemed to show up right on time.” 

Rosa smiles again and moves over to ghost her lips over Maria’s cheek. “Thank you. You always saw the best in me. Still do,” she says with a quirk of her lips. 

Liz finds her stuff hidden behind a loose rock, and inside is a note from Noah. “Well, it’s not much, but at least you know there was someone secret. I don’t know what good that’s going to do you right now,” she tells them.

They decide to head to the drive-in, though Rosa knows that’s not where “Small Town Saturday Night” is. In the meantime, she decides to pop in on her murderer to see what he’s up to.

/

Noah’s at the drive-in already, guilting Isobel about bailing on him so much for her brothers lately, though of course he’s not framing it that way.

“Don’t guilt her about not being present!” Rosa spews at him as he looks lovingly into Isobel’s eyes. “You literally inhabited her body with her for years! You don’t deserve any more of her!”

She throws her hands in the air and shakes her head as she hurries away, not willing to subject herself to Noah’s manipulations today.

/

She follows Michael and says, “I can’t believe you, who are suspicious of everyone, can’t even see what’s going on in front of your face.” They slow as they approach his truck and she sighs. “Okay, I’m sorry. That was uncalled for. I know from personal experience how good an actor he is. It’s not your fault, it’s his.”

He lifts his toolbox into his truck and turns to get in when Alex says tentatively, “Leaving so soon?” from the other side of the bed.

Michael sighs and rests his arms on the edge of the truck. “Seen it before,” he says, mocking. “I hate how it ends.”

Rosa’s breath catches at the double meaning. “Wow, don’t pull your punches, do you, Mikey?”

Alex licks his lips and half-nods in acknowledgement. “I’ll tell you what. I’ll split this sixer with you,” he says, dropping the bottles into the bed of Michael’s truck. “If you let me watch from here.” He pulls down the tailgate and sits, eyes on Michael. 

Rosa holds her breath, looking between the two; Alex’s eyes, soft and apologetic, Michael’s wary and hurt. Finally, Michael grabs a bottle and sits on the tailgate, leaving a couple feet of space between them, but that doesn’t seem to matter to Alex, who smiles softly at him. Michael takes a drink and shakes his head, mouth still slightly twisted in a grimace.

“Let yourself have this, Mikey,” Rosa says quietly, standing in front of him. “Take the olive branch and believe it will all work out. You both deserve this.”

/

Rosa spends some time wandering around the drive-in, people-watching and waiting for Liz and Maria to arrive. She glares at all of the townsfolk who used to come into the diner every week, and then shunned her father or worse after the ‘accident’. She scoffs at the assholes who gorge on tacos and burritos from one of the food trucks as they sit in the backs of their MAGA-stickered trucks. She clenches her fists when she sees Jesse Manes play and joke around with a young boy and then immediately shame his own son for daring to be seen with Michael.

“God, I really hate this town sometimes,” she says under her breath, looking around for Liz.

She spots her sister and Maria walking around, laughing, and across the way, she sees Isobel, watching Liz with an expression she’s come to know means Isobel is in someone’s mind. She heads over to her instead.

She stands by Isobel, looking around to see if anyone notices how out of it she seems, but everyone’s eyes are focused on Jesse Manes. “What are you doing, Isobel?” she says quietly.

Manes finishes his speech and everyone starts to head back to their cars. Isobel snaps out of it and looks like she’s going to be sick. She takes off behind one of the food cars and Rosa follows her.

Isobel throws up and Michael’s there a moment later, handing her a bottle of nail polish remover. “Did you do it?” he asks. “Is she leaving town?”

Rosa sucks in a breath and looks accusingly between the two of them. “You’re what?!”

Isobel starts explaining that she couldn’t do it, because she kept seeing flashes of Rosa.

“What?” Rosa says, shaking her head. “That makes no sense. Why would you see me instead of Liz?”

“I don’t think this is just some high school crush,” Isobel is telling Michael; an explanation about why it will be difficult to get Liz to leave. “I think that she and Max might be--”

“Maybe she and Max what?” Max says, stepping around the truck to join them.

Michael leaves, apparently having had enough of Max for the last few weeks, and Max tentatively steps closer to Isobel. There’s a tension between the two of them Rosa doesn’t understand. Max and Michael have been at odds the last ten years, constantly fighting and bickering, but neither of them have had that dynamic with Isobel. 

“Your speech was good,” Max offers, and the tension eases. 

Isobel laughs in relief. “Thanks. I didn’t think you were gonna show up, after I…” she trails off and Rosa tilts her head to the side.

“After you what?” Rosa asks, looking between the two of them.

Max shrugs and steps closer to Isobel. “Maybe you were right. Maybe Liz isn’t gonna happen for me.”

Rosa makes a wounded noise and looks accusingly at Isobel. “You told him that? Is, that was mean!”

“Cameron and I were hooking up before Liz got back into town,” Max continues. “Maybe that could be something, if I try.”

Isobel’s eyes narrow and she looks conflicted. “Tell him he shouldn’t have to force his feelings,” Rosa says to her. Then she turns to Max. “You shouldn’t have to  _ try _ to have feelings for her, Max. Forcing feelings to be there which aren’t isn’t fair to you or to her.”

/

Liz and Maria are driving back into town, singing as loud as they can to the radio, and everyone else is at the drive-in, so Rosa heads over to Kyle’s house. He’s been worrying her lately, with his new involvement in Project Shepherd and all the secrets he’s been forced to keep about the aliens.

He’s at his apartment, phone hooked up to his computer while the printer next to him whirrs and spits out several pieces of paper. His eyes are intense, focused and narrowed on each of the photos he’s printed out.

“What do you have there?” she asks as she steps behind him to look at the pages. She gasps and leans forward to brush her fingers over the page. “Jim’s letters. Is that what you were looking for this morning?”

He doesn’t answer of course, just sighs and sets one down to pick up another. Rosa looks at the ones already laid out on the desk and shakes her head. “It’s the same symbols from that piece of the ship, but he doesn’t know the language. He was so messed up in the end, after what Manes did to him,” she says, fists clenching at her sides. “He was just doodling the shapes he knew.”

Kyle checks his phone and sighs. “Damn it, Liz,” he says. He pushes away from the desk as the last page prints, gathers up all the papers and his phone, and leaves.

“You’re not going to give those to Manes, are you?” she asks, trotting next to him. “They don’t mean anything that I can tell, but that man is still not to be trusted, you know this.”

Kyle gets into his car and she joins him, only leaving to find Liz again when she sees he’s heading for the drive-in as well.

/

Liz and Maria are getting high on top of the Crashdown. Rosa is simultaneously proud of and disappointed in her sister for finally letting loose like this.

It seems they’re getting into a Rosa state of mind to try to find her hiding spot, and while they do that, they’re catching up on the lost years. Maria tells Liz about Chad, who was more of a dick than Maria knows, so Rosa’s glad that asshole’s gone. Liz laughs when she tells Maria she left Diego behind in Denver a few weeks ago.

“I just...I couldn’t connect,” she chokes out, and it’s a cross between a laugh and a sob. “I couldn’t feel anything!” she tells Maria.

Rosa sighs and rubs her forehead. “You can feel plenty, Liz. You just wouldn’t let yourself.” She walks over to the edge of the roof and looks down at the town she hated so much when she was younger. Still hates, really. “Maybe because you always wanted to come back here, to Roswell.” To Max.

Maria’s pointing up at the sky, showing Liz her constellation.

“Hmm. Just looks like an arrow to me,” Liz says, voice rough.

Maria laughs. “That’s what Rosa always used to say. Maybe you two didn’t think so differently after all.”

Liz’s eyes wander back up to the stars and she tilts her head thoughtfully. Rosa has to smile. “Did you figure it out?”

Liz stands up and heads straight for the empty power box, sliding it open to pull out a tin. Maria smiles as Liz brings it over and opens it up. She pulls out a piece of paper and Rosa tilts her head to the side. “What is that?”

“It’s a love letter,” Liz says as she scans it.

“What? I never--” Rosa’s eyes widen and she covers her mouth with both hands. “Oh shit.”

“From who? Ophiuchus?” Maria asks.

“Oh no. Oh, Liz. Don’t--” she says, reaching forward to hold her hand in front of it, but of course that doesn’t stop Liz from reaching the end.

“No, from Max Evans,” she says slowly.

Maria bolts up and moves next to her to read the letter. “What?”

Liz is silent, staring down at the letter in confusion, and then her face goes blank. “I have to go,” she says, folding the letter again and shoving it in her pocket.

“Liz, it’s not what you think,” Rosa says, hand hovering over her arm.

“You want me to go with you?” Maria asks warily.

Liz shakes her head and doesn’t look back as she heads for the stairs. “No, I don’t want anyone else there for this.”

“Fuck,” Rosa says, hurrying after her.

/

Liz interrupts Max and Cam before they can get in trouble for indecent exposure and makes Max follow her away from the crowd for their confrontation.

“You were sleeping with my sister!” she accuses him, and Rosa rears back at that one.

“Okay, I know I was kind of a bitch, but I knew you liked him, so I wouldn’t have done that,” she says, standing between the two of them and watching as Liz hands over the letter. She looks Max up and down and says, “Plus, he’s not really my type.”

Max looks down at the letter and pales, swallowing hard as he looks back up to Liz.

She yanks the letter away from him and starts reading it back to him. “I feel like I’m disappearing until you look at me,” she reads. “And then I’m so completely seen. I’ve never liked that feeling before.”

“Please, just stop,” Max says, shifting in place, his whole body tense. “Come on.”

Rosa squirms uncomfortably; she hadn’t read the letter that night, just put it away where Liz would never find it. Hearing the words he’d written for Liz a decade ago, when he’d been so hopeful, hurts her heart.

“I wrote that note for you, Liz!” he finally blurts out.

Liz denies it right away. “You touched my lips and I stopped breathing for a week,” she reads. “This isn’t about us! You and I never kissed!”

“Which is shocking, quite frankly,” Rosa murmurs, still standing between them.

Max clarifies what he meant, and Liz realizes it’s true because that was the day of the blackout.

“Rosa must have found the letter,” he tells her.

Rosa looks up at him, confused. “You  _ know _ I did. You saw me take it off the windshield, and then I yelled at you to stay away from her. You...must have known I wouldn’t give it to her,” Rosa says, voice soft with regret. Her eyes fill with tears and she nods. “And after what happened later that night, you must have figured the letter was better off staying lost. I’m so sorry, Max. I’m so sorry I took that letter from you.” She steps forward and places her hand next to his cheek, so she’s looking up at him when Liz tells him she knows Rosa was murdered by an alien.

His eyes widen in shock. “What? How-how do you--”

Rosa turns to look at Liz in surprise as she continues, “So was it you, Max?”

Rosa makes an indignant sound and shakes her head, stepping closer to Liz. “Lizzie, you know he wouldn’t, why would you even--?” She shakes her head again as she continues to watch Liz tear his heart into pieces in front of her.

He tells her the truth about writing the letter and leaving it on their car, even tells the truth about Rosa’s confrontation with him, though he neglects to mention she took the letter on purpose.

“You don’t have to protect a dead woman, Max,” she says quietly, though she is touched he would try.

Liz doesn’t seem to like that sentiment though. “I asked you, point-blank if you saw her that night,” she says.

Max swallows hard and says, “You have enough painful memories.” Liz looks away, tears in her eyes and shakes her head. He continues, voice desperate, “After everything that we have been through, do you truly believe that I am capable of killing someone you love?” 

Rosa moves over to Liz, arms hovering around her in as much of a hug as a ghost can give. “You know he wouldn’t,” she whispers into Liz’s ear.

“Liz, I have loved you my entire life,” Max says, and Rosa hears Liz’s gasp.

“Trust him, Lizzie. You know you want to,” Rosa says. 

“That’s not what this is about,” Liz says, shaking her head, the smallest of catches in her voice.

“Maybe that’s not what this is about, but it sure as hell isn’t nothing, Liz,” Rosa says, and she can’t watch this anymore, so she leaves.

/

She needs a breather from all the angst, so she paces behind the bar with Maria for a while, using her calm, welcoming presence to sort out her own feelings.

Liz apparently has the same idea, because she shows up a while later to fill Maria in on the contents of the letter and the story behind it. 

“He told me he loved me,” Liz confesses. “Then and now, too, I think.”

Maria slips past Rosa and around the bar, taking a drink as she goes. “Wow, that’s...that’s a lot,” she says, eyes searching Liz’s. “What’d you say?”

Liz shakes her head and says, “I just don’t trust him.”

Maria shakes her head. “Why not? He’s always seemed like a great guy, upstanding citizen and all that.”

Liz lets out a slow breath and says, “I know, but what if that’s just it? What if he’s too good to be true?”

Maria rolls her eyes and says, “What, like that sweet-boy exterior is hiding a malicious monster? Come on.”

Rosa lets out a hysterical laugh and covers her face with her hands. “It wouldn’t be the first time, but that’s not Max.”

Liz’s lips twist and she shakes her head. “I don’t know. Rosa always warned me to protect my heart. Maybe all these reminders of her are bringing up that feeling again, that need to…” She lifts a hand and places it over her heart. “That need to put a cage around it, to protect it.”

Rosa shakes her head. “That’s not a new feeling, Liz. You’ve always been that way, and it’s kept you safe, but it’s also kept you isolated.”

Maria stands up and heads back behind the bar. “Well, for my part, I’ve never noticed anything too awful about him,” she says, wiggling her fingers around her head.

Liz smiles and rolls her eyes, “Yeah, well, maybe you’re right. Maybe I’m just being paranoid.”

Her tone says that’s not how she really feels, so Rosa has to sigh and place her hand over Liz’s. “I was nineteen and bitter and scared when I said that, Liz. I’m sorry that’s one of the lessons I left you with. Not everyone you love is going to hurt you.”

Moments later, the lights in the bar go out and everyone gasps, startled. “Well that can’t be good,” Rosa says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Kudos and comments are appreciated : )
> 
> Many thanks to larenoz for helping with this chapter.
> 
> Find me on tumblr: islndgurl777


	4. Where Have All the Cowboys Gone?

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> She’s handing him his class ring and asking him if he got back together with Rosa before she died.
> 
> Rosa, standing between them, snorts and crosses her arms over her chest. “You are barking up the wrong tree with this one, Liz. He was old news by that point.”
> 
> “It’s just, I heard she was seeing someone at the end and I’m trying to figure out who it was,” Liz says, an explanation and a question all in one.
> 
> Rosa shrugs. “He doesn’t know. No one did, except the guy who killed me, and he wasn’t exactly forthcoming about his real identity at the time, so…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to estel_willow for taking a look at this chapter!
> 
> I used transcripts.foreverdreaming.org for help with episode dialogue again.
> 
> I am a little behind my writing schedule, as my mom is visiting me, but she's leaving Wednesday, so I hope to get the next chapter done by the weekend.

The morning after the power goes out through the whole town, Rosa sits on the counter in the kitchen and watches her father cheerfully cook double orders of everything for the people who’ve braved the heat to come out for an early lunch. “What else am I going to do with all this food, _mija_? I can’t let it go bad,” he’d told Liz when she’d raised a single eyebrow at the over-full plates.

Most of the people in town don’t have backup generators in their homes, so they’re out around town, looking for some relief from the heat, and Arturo is prepared for those people who are looking for a freshly-cooked, unspoiled meal as well. “Give it a rest, _Papi_ ,” Rosa says, as her father starts in on another double order of eggs. “You don’t have to overfeed the entire population of Roswell. The power might come back on soon.” She rolls her eyes as he hums, and shifts to the side as he reaches past her head for some spices on the rack above the stove.

She shakes her head and slides off the counter, looking through the window out into the restaurant, where Liz is chatting at a booth with… Rosa does a double-take, eyes widening. Liz is talking to Frederico. Rosa looks back at her dad to make sure he’s still preoccupied with the food and makes her way over to her sister.

She’s handing him his class ring and asking him if he got back together with Rosa before she died.

Rosa, standing between them, snorts and crosses her arms over her chest. “You are barking up the wrong tree with this one, Liz. He was old news by that point.”

“It’s just, I heard she was seeing someone at the end and I’m trying to figure out who it was,” Liz says, an explanation and a question all in one.

Rosa shrugs. “He doesn’t know. No one did, except the guy who killed me, and he wasn’t exactly forthcoming about his real identity at the time, so…”

Frederico’s eyes widen and he says, “Oh, crap.”

Liz and Rosa both turn to see their father glaring at Frederico from the kitchen. Rosa’s lips quirk and she shakes her head as she says, “You better run, dude. He wasn’t kidding when he said you aren’t welcome here anymore.” At the same time, Liz is reassuring him that Arturo’s fine. “No, he’s not,” Rosa says, laughing when their dad comes out of the kitchen wielding a meat cleaver.

Liz glares at their father after he chases Frederico out, but he looks unrepentant. He heads back to the kitchen and Liz is waylaid by a customer, but Rosa knows from both of their pinched lips and narrowed eyes there’s going to be a fight, and she has no interest in watching that, so she leaves to start checking in on everyone else.

/

Three of her aliens are together at Max’s, which makes things easier. However, they’re talking about messing with Liz’s mind again, which is very not cool.

Rosa rolls her eyes as she paces across the fire pit from them on Max’s patio. “You’ve tried before and said it doesn’t work. This is generally just a terrible idea, and you need to come up with a new one.”

Max sounds hesitant when he asks, “Will she forget me?”

“She could never,” Rosa says on a sigh, sitting on the edge of the fire pit across from him, hand hovering over his knee.

“No, just how she feels about you,” Isobel says.

Now Rosa rolls her eyes and scoffs. “You tried that ten years ago and she still has those feelings for him. You know she loves him _now_ , Isobel. You have to know this isn’t going to work!”

Cameron pulls up in a cruiser then and chides Max for not checking in at the station, telling him they need to get going to work. She rolls up her window and turns away from him, looking straight out the front window of the cruiser.

Rosa looks between the two of them, eyebrows furrowed, and says, “Why’s she being so frosty with you this morning? What ha--” Her eyes widen and she lets out a huff of laughter, covering her mouth with her hands. “Tell me you didn’t just ditch her at the drive-in last night after Liz yelled at you.” She looks between them again and laughs at Max, shaking her head. “Max! The girl had her hand on your dick and you just left her there? You are such an idiot.”

Isobel stands up and says quietly, “What do you want to do about Liz?”

Rosa sucks in a breath, her smile dropping as she takes in the look on Max’s face.

“What I want stopped mattering a long time ago,” he says. “Do it. Get inside her head. Send her away.” His voice is shaky and Rosa has to swallow the wounded sound that threatens to burst forth. He leaves to get ready for work and she’s torn between following him to offer hollow comfort and staying with Michael and Isobel to find out what exactly they’re planning on doing to Liz.

“Are you sure about this? Making her forget her feelings for him?” Michael asks, leaning forward and lowering his voice so only Isobel can hear him. Surprised Michael’s the one bringing this up, Rosa stays to see what they’ll say.

Isobel lets out a long sigh and shrugs. “Her feelings for him are what are keeping her here. If we want her gone, she needs to forget what she feels for him.”

Rosa shakes her head and starts pacing in front of them again. “I’m not an expert on your powers, but I don’t think you can do that.”

Michael glances back into the house and lowers his voice again, sounding more vulnerable. “Is that even something you can do? If her feelings are strong enough to last a decade…” He shakes his head and shrugs.

Isobel rubs her forehead and sighs. “Maybe I can just...enhance the bad memories associated with Max and use them to convince her to go. Convince her she wouldn’t want to stay for him when he’s connected to so many terrible things, or something like that.” She looks to Michael to see if he agrees with her thought process.

Rosa shakes her head. “I don’t think she has enough bad memories associated with him for that to work. The worst ones would be what she’s learned about my murder, and you don’t want her to focus on those too much anyway.”

Michael’s eyes are a little distant, and finally he lets out a long breath and shrugs. “I don’t know, Is. Sometimes the terrible things aren’t enough to outweigh the great ones.”

Rosa looks at him sharply. “What was with that wistful tone, Michael Guerin? What’s happened _now_?”

Isobel shoots him a sad look and opens her mouth to respond, but Max is coming back out in his uniform. “You’ll let me know when it’s done?” he asks quietly, looking between them.

Isobel searches his eyes for a long moment before she nods and says, “Of course.”

He nods to both of them, then heads for the cruiser.

“There’s another problem though,” Michael says as they watch the cruiser turn around and drive away. “I thought you weren’t strong enough to change Liz’s mind last night.”

Isobel says, “That’s why we’re going to the Wild Pony, so I can practice.” And she completely ignores Michael’s first comment, which makes Rosa throw her hands up in frustration.

Michael blows past it too, which is just so typical of him. “You didn’t tell Max how Liz really feels about him,” he says.

Isobel pauses for a moment, sad eyes turned to where her brother just drove away. “It’ll hurt less, if he doesn’t know,” she says.

“Will it though?” Rosa asks, and from the look on Michael’s face, he’s thinking the same thing. Actually, from the look on Isobel’s, she might be thinking it too.

/

Mimi’s watching a cooking competition show and eating popcorn when Rosa shows up at her place, but she exits out of it as soon as Rosa sits down next to her on the couch.

“You know I don’t mind a little GBBO, Mimi,” she says, eyeing the popcorn longingly.

Mimi hums and smiles, setting the bowl between them on the couch, and starts a new show.

Rosa smiles and slouches down into the couch a bit. “I could do with a little Jessica Jones, I guess.”

/

She wanders downstairs after a couple of episodes to check in on Maria and see if Michael and Isobel have shown up yet.

They have, and he’s stealing from the bar.

“You think I don’t know your game?” Maria asks him. “You come in here when you’ve drunk enough to kill that dramatic cowboy angst, you start a fight so you get kicked out before you pay.”

Michael’s smile is not the least bit ashamed. In fact, it’s more along the lines of a flirtatious smirk. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Rosa says, rounding the bar to come sit next to him, watching the interplay closely.

Maria continues, voice soft. “You can’t swindle a mercenary, Guerin. I keep a tab. But I got one thing you can do for me to pay off your debt.”

“Oh yeah?” Michael asks, voice just as soft, and a little bit sexy.

“What the fuck, Michael? What about Alex?” Rosa says, slamming her hand on the bar between them, glaring at Michael.

Maria leans away from him and her tone changes from slightly flirty to all-business immediately. “Get Regina George out of here, and make sure she never comes back,” she says, nodding over to Isobel.

  
  


“Wow. I’m jealous, DeLuca,” Michael says, same flirty tone as before. “I thought I was your least favorite customer.” And there’s that flirty smirk again.

Maria shrugs, a little smile on her face. “Stiff competition,” she says.

Rosa shakes her head and rubs her hands on her eyes. “What is going on right now with you two?” she mutters. “Michael, you and Alex _just_ went on a date last night. Why are you over here flirting with Maria?”

Of course he doesn’t answer, so she goes over to sit next to Isobel. “What’s with your idiot brothers and their dumb love lives?”

Isobel pulls out her phone to text Noah, smiling and blushing at his frankly risque messages. Rosa gags when she sees them and rolls her eyes. “I guess I shouldn’t be surprised. Maybe making idiotic romantic choices is genetic?”

Isobel sighs as she puts her phone away and takes a sip of the water Hank’s brought back for her. He starts drinking his cosmo and Isobel’s eyes go distant again, presumably as she starts messing with his brain some more.

A few minutes later, Isobel sits back looking pleased, and Hank stands up, taking out his phone and dialing a number.

“What did you convince him to do?” Rosa asks curiously, chin resting in her hand at the table next to Isobel.

Isobel takes another sip of water, but her hands are shaking a little, so she pulls a bottle of nail polish remover out of her purse and takes a sip of that too. When she’s done, she focuses her attention on Hank again, eyeing him as he pledges a good chunk of money to helping immigrants.

Rosa lifts an eyebrow and tilts her head in a nod. “Hmm. If you can manipulate Racist Hank into donating money to Mexicans, maybe it _wouldn’t_ be impossible for you to convince Liz to leave.” She sighs and says, “Wish you wouldn’t though.”

Isobel gets up to follow Hank and, unsteady on her feet, runs into a table.

Maria calls her out for being drunk, and Isobel accuses her of hating her because of the incident at Homecoming, when Isobel had gotten Maria kicked out.

They start bickering more, the insults getting nastier, Rosa’s eyebrows getting higher and higher on her forehead as she takes in the venom they exchange, when Michael comes over to mediate. Maria snaps at him about it and he looks a little hurt. She tells them both to be gone by the time she gets back and heads back over to the bar.

Michael asks Isobel if she’s okay, but he’s shooting quick looks over at Maria like he wants to check in on her too, which. What?

“It’s like, she can make nice with Mr. All Lives Matter over there, but she thinks _I’m_ the devil?” Isobel says, eyes laser-focused on Maria.

Rosa groans because she knows that look, and Michael must realize it too because he stands between Isobel and the bar to block her view of Maria. “Don’t, don’t, don’t do this,” he says. “Don’t get distracted.”

The way he says it, and the way he looks over at Maria when Isobel says she’s pulling out the big guns and going after _her_ for practice, would make Rosa’s breath catch, if she had any functional lungs. “You really do like her, don’t you?” Rosa says quietly, watching the way Michael watches Maria. “But,” she says, shaking her head. “What about Alex? What happened between last night and this morning that you’re so ready to-to-to... _move on_ again already?” She stands on her tiptoes to search his eyes, but he’s still watching Maria as Isobel walks up to the bar. He finally wrenches his eyes away when Isobel sits down.

He rubs a hand over his eyes and sighs, and Rosa lets out a slow breath. “Fine. I’ll go ask _him_ ,” she says, finally leaving the bar.

/

Alex is sitting on the edge of his bed, shirtless, with his right pant leg rolled up so he can pull on his prosthetic. Rosa sighs heavily and lays down with her head by his hip, looking up at him. “What happened last night?” she asks flatly.

His hair is damp, curling slightly at the ends, and a few drops of water trail down his chest. She looks closely at his eyes and notices a slight redness around them. “Seriously,” she says, turning on her side and propping her head on her hand. “You guys were on a date. It looked like it was going well.”

He finishes adjusting the prosthetic and unfolds the pant leg over it. There’s a long moment where he just sits, staring down at the floor with a blank face as he chews his bottom lip, elbows on his knees, with hands clutching the sides of his head. Rosa sits up and scoots closer, hesitantly holding a hand over the center of his back. “Alex,” she whispers, wishing she could rest a comforting hand on his shoulder.

Finally, he shakes himself out of it and stands slowly, taking a moment to steady himself on the edge of the bed before he walks the few feet to his dresser, where his crutch is leaning. He looks at it, lips twisted, then finally rolls his eyes and huffs out a breath as he maneuvers it under his arm and starts for the door. 

Rosa leaps up from the bed and follows him, watching him closely for signs of pain, physical or emotional, but his face is a blank mask. He gets into his car and breathes in and out slowly for a minute before starting it up and putting it into gear. The music plays quietly on the radio as they drive, and Rosa watches him in silence, only relaxing when she sees his fingers tapping along to the radio; a sign of his ease.

“I hope, whatever happens, you’ll be okay,” she says quietly to him. “You deserve to be happy.”

She rides with him the rest of the way to the hospital, and when he goes in for his check-up, she leaves to find her brother.

/

He’s glaring up at Max Evans, because of course he is.

Rosa rolls her eyes and stands to the side to look up at them both. “Are you guys about done with your dick-measuring contest?”

“My father was a real hero,” Kyle is saying, still glaring up at Max, and Rosa has no idea why her brother’s being so hostile to him. He locks eyes with Max and continues, “If there was something he could do to help someone, he did it. No matter the risk to himself.” Rosa sucks in her breath as her eyes widen when Kyle looks Max up and down and says, “Why’d you become a cop, Evans?”

“Jesus, Kyle!” Rosa shouts, throwing her hands up. “Why don’t you just take out a billboard: _I know you’re an alien with magic hands! Come heal my patient, you coward!_ ” She paces back and forth next to them and continues to yell at her dumbass brother. “Are you kidding me?”

“We’re just men,” Max is telling him. “We can’t play God.”

And the look Kyle gives him is definitely his “you are the shit on my shoe, don’t give me that crap” look. Rosa screams in frustration, pulling lightly on her hair. “Stop! Are you asking to be punched right now?”

Max offers to say a prayer for Kyle’s patient, and her brother finally makes a good choice and walks the fuck away from Max.

She follows and continues to lecture him as they walk down the hall. “That man has been waiting ten years or more to punch you, and you’re just going to goad him on like that? Where have your better senses gone? Where’s the man who grew the hell up when he left Roswell, Kyle Manuel Valenti?”

She follows him into another room and chokes on her next words when she sees her father, asleep in a patient bed with an admittance bracelet on his wrist. She’s frozen in the doorway for a second before a sob wrenches free and she rushes over to him, her hands hovering over his chest.

“ _Papi_?” she says, chest heaving. “Wh-...I-...” She shakes her head and another sob bursts free. “Kyle, what happened?” she asks, eyes filled with tears as she looks over to him at the foot of her father’s bed. He’s looking down at his chart, calm as you please, humming and nodding at what he finds there. “Kyle!” she yells, wiping her nose with her sleeve.

Kyle steps forward to take her father’s pulse, and she has to let out a laughing sob when Arturo wakes up just to tell Kyle he never liked him.

Kyle takes a second to absorb his comment before he nods in acknowledgement of the statement. “I know. I was a dumb kid,” he says.

Rosa laughs again and wipes at the tears on her face. “You’re still a dumb kid sometimes, like with that shit you just pulled with Max,” she tells him.

“You’re prediabetic,” Kyle tells her dad. “We’re gonna get you treatment. Safely,” he assures him, and Rosa lets out a long breath as she nods. 

The lights flicker and Kyle’s pager goes off so he leaves, but Rosa stays and sits down on the edge of the bed, her hand hovering over her dad’s. “You scared me out of my mind and I’ve only been here five minutes. What did this do to Liz?” She shakes her head and reaches over to ghost her palm over his cheek. “Were you fighting with her about Frederico, and that’s how this happened? _Papi_ , you need to start taking better care of yourself.”

He closes his eyes and starts breathing slowly, getting a little more rest before he heads home. Rosa holds both her palms over his chest and shrugs as she whispers, “I’m sorry I left you too soon, but you can’t do that to Liz, you just can’t. She needs you.” She wipes her nose with her sleeve again and clears her throat. “And, quite frankly, I do not need you hanging around with me all the time, hounding me about my hobbies again, okay? So just.” She sighs, her hands patting over his chest one more time. “Just stay here, healthy and _alive_. For Liz. And for me,” she shrugs.

She watches him sleep for a few more minutes before the main lights in the room flicker on and she has to let out a heavy sigh. “God damn aliens,” she mutters, standing up.

/

Max is in the basement of the hospital, passed out on the floor on top of some shelves it looks like he blasted into. Rosa inhales slowly and shakes her head as she exhales. “Idiot,” she says, kneeling next to him and watching his chest as he breathes.

She hears someone coming a few minutes later and gets up to see who it is. Cameron comes around the corner a second later, flashlight drawn, and calls for him. When she sees him on the floor she runs over and says, “Max. Max.” He starts to stir and she says, “Hey, hey. Max.”

Max groans and asks if the power is back. Cameron’s eyes continue to run over him, checking him over discreetly, and she says, “Yeah, but just here at the hospital. Are you okay?”

Max starts to sit up and Rosa steps forward, hands outstretched. “Maybe you should lay for a little longer?”

“I was messing with that thing,” Max says, shaking his head. “Must have gotten shocked.” And then the idiot starts standing up with Cameron’s help, groaning the whole way. 

“Just take it easy, will you?” Rosa says as he moves back up the hallway to the stairs.

Cameron’s eyes have been drawn to the transformer Max had been messing with and she freezes. Rosa tilts her head to look between it and her curiously. “What is it?” she asks, but Cameron just follows Max back up to the main floor of the hospital.

/

Since her resident alien seems to be fine after his ridiculous act of gallantry, Rosa heads back to her father’s room to sit with him as he sleeps.

A while later, Kyle comes at the end of his shift to take him home, and Rosa rides in the back seat of his car while Arturo sits silently in the passenger seat. “Well, this isn’t awkward at all,” she says lightly, looking between the two. Kyle seems to be relaxed though, and her father is just looking out the window as they drive through town, so it’s really not a terrible ride after all.

Kyle gets him settled in his room and goes to find Liz. Rosa follows so she can hear about her father’s treatment and know how to keep an eye on him too.

Liz is sitting on the floor at the foot of her bed when they walk in, and there’s a blank look on her face that immediately sets Rosa on edge. “What is it?” she asks, sitting down next to Liz, eyes drawn to the piece of paper in her hand. Her eyes widen. “Where did you _find_ this?” she asks, hand reaching out to hover over it. “It was with the ticket, in my backpack, which I couldn’t find anywhere the night--” She swallows and shakes her head. “Where was it?”

Liz doesn’t answer her, of course, just explains to Kyle about the note and comparing it to the handwriting in their yearbooks. Rosa scrunches up her nose and rears back. “Okay, no. Not my boyfriend, Liz. Gross.”

Liz shows Kyle the two handwriting samples side by side and he shakes his head. “I don’t understand.” 

There’s a low level of rage in Liz’s voice when she looks him in the eye and says, “It was your dad, Kyle. Your father, the town sheriff, was having an affair with my teenage, drug addict sister.”

Rosa leaps up and starts pacing next to them, shaking her head. “Okay, no. No, no, no, no, no. Please stop.”

They stand up too and Kyle starts pacing the opposite way Rosa does. “No, my father was a good sheriff,” he says, voice shaking. “A good dad, and a good husband.”

Rosa stops across from him and shrugs. “Well, maybe not the good husband part, since,” and she gestures down at herself.

Liz will not be deterred, and she starts explaining her proof again, practically shoving it in his face.

Kyle reacts defensively. “Are you so desperate to clear Max’s name that you’ll drag my dad’s through the mud?”

“No,” Rosa says softly, holding her arms to her body. “She’s just trying to find something, some reason for what happened, though she’s not going to find it with Jim.”

Liz takes a second to regroup and think things through as she stares up a Kyle. She tells him he’s right, reasoning that there’s no way it could be true because Rosa would never hook up with a cop. “A true statement,” Rosa agrees with a nod. “Though Max’s partner is kind of hot…”

Liz puts the yearbook down, putting the clue away, and looks up at Kyle, an apology in her eyes.

Kyle’s shoulders drop, but not in relief. His eyes are distant and he takes a deep breath as he closes Liz’s bedroom door. “There’s something I haven’t told you,” he says, voice low and solemn.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up. “What are you talking about?”

Kyle can barely meet Liz’s eyes when he tells her Jim knew about aliens, and his words start coming faster when he says, “If he was sleeping with Rosa--”

Rosa shakes her head and steps up to him. “No, no, hey,” she says, placing her hands near his cheeks. “Don’t think like that. He wouldn’t have slept with a teenager, you know that. Don’t let Liz’s wild conspiracies get to you.”

Liz herself steps in then and says, “I am _sure_ I’m wrong about this, okay?”

Rosa turns to her and says, “Thank you, Lizzie.”

Kyle shakes his head and says, voice breaking, “You don’t believe that.”

Rosa turns back to him and says, “Doesn’t matter if she does. I need _you_ to believe it. Jim was flawed, but he was a good dad to you, and to me for a while. Don’t forget that.”

Liz steps forward and places her hand on Kyle’s cheek, and Rosa steps out from between them. “You’re one of the best people I know,” Liz says, looking up into Kyle’s eyes. “You don’t deserve that.”

Kyle’s eyes flicker down to Liz’s lips and Rosa’s eyes widen. “Oh, please don’t,” she says, covering her eyes with her hands. They pull apart and Rosa uncovers her eyes, letting out a relieved sigh, but then they decide to have sex, and Rosa is definitely not sticking around for that, so she leaves.

/

Rosa’s gotten in the habit, over the years, of making regular check-ins on important people in her life, starting with her family and ending with her enemies. It feels odd that she hasn’t checked in on Jesse Manes all day, especially when he’s bound to be lurking around town due to the alien-induced blackout.

She finds him at a restaurant, sitting across from Jenna Cameron, and oh, that can’t be good. He’s telling her he has a proposition for her, and when she comes back with a friendly declination of his offer, Rosa lets out a slow breath. “Good girl,” Rosa says, nodding. “Listen to your instincts on this one.”

And then Manes brings up someone named Charlie, and Cameron goes stiff all over. “Fuuuuuck,” Rosa says. She turns to Manes and says quietly, “Don’t do this, I like her. She’s honest and has morals, and she’s kind of a badass.”

Cameron’s narrowed her eyes on him, grip tight on her drink, and she lets out a slow breath. “I’ll think about it,” she tells him with a shrug.

Manes smiles that smug, “I’ve got you and you and I both know it” smile and says, “You do that.” 

He finishes his drink and Rosa scowls over at him. “Classy as ever, Manes,” she says. “Blackmailing her to do your bidding. Haven’t you had enough of that with your own children? Prick.”

/

She wants to go home, check on her dad and Liz, but she definitely does not want to walk in on Liz and Kyle having sex, so she ends up in front of the Crashdown. When she sees Kyle’s car still there across the way, she sighs and starts pacing the sidewalk outside, hoping they’ll be finished sooner rather than later.

Max walks up a few minutes later just as Kyle’s leaving through the front door of the Crashdown. “Oh shit,” Rosa says, looking between the two.

Max has stopped and Kyle’s slowed down, but he speeds up again to stop in front of Max. “I just wanted to thank you for your help today,” Kyle says, looking up at him.

Rosa raises her eyebrows, a smile threatening on her lips. “Wow, Kyle. That was very gracious of you.”

Kyle shifts for a second, like he’s trying to figure out what to say, and then he starts, “I became a doctor because I wanted to be a hero, like my dad.” There’s a little regret in his voice when he says that, and Rosa’s hand hovers over his shoulder. He continues, “I wanted the glory. But glory isn’t why you became a cop, is it?”

Rosa rolls her eyes, because he’s not being any more subtle that he was earlier, and the only reason she thinks Max isn’t punching him for it is because of Kyle’s apologetic tone.

“Have a good night,” Kyle says, sending a genuine smile to the alien who would probably like to kick his ass, and then he leaves.

Max stands there another second, jaw clenching because he must know at this point, and then he heads for the Crashdown.

Rosa trots alongside his long strides and says, “Okay, I know this looks bad, her telling Kyle about you, but I swear he’s a good guy. He’s not going to turn you in, especially after what you did today.”

He opens the door and enters. Liz is back in the kitchen, working on something, and she yells out, “We’re closed,” before she looks up to see who it is. When she realizes, she puts down whatever she was working on and comes out into the dining room.

His voice cracks when he asks if she told Kyle about him, and her answer is steady when she tells him she has. 

“At least you’re not lying to him anymore,” Rosa murmurs, sitting on a stool at the counter between them.

“And my family?” Max asks, and Rosa’s heart breaks at the feeling of betrayal in his voice.

“No, not them,” Liz assures him. She explains why she had to tell Kyle, and that he was the only one she could talk to about her suspicious about Rosa. “I know him,” she says, stepping closer to him, trying to reassure him Kyle can be trusted. “He won’t do anything, unless…”

“Unless what? Unless you two decide I’m a killer?” Max spews back, hurt radiating from him. 

“No, that’s not going to happen, Max!” Rosa says, leaping up to stand in front of him as he turns to leave, ghosting her hands over his arms. “She knows in her heart you didn’t do it, she’s just scared.”

He turns back when Liz steps closer and says she wants to believe him, tells him about the armor around her heart that prevents her from doing so. “I have never wanted anything as much as I want to believe that you didn’t hurt my sister,” Liz tells him, tears in her eyes. “But I can’t shake the feeling that you’re lying.”

The hurt in her voice breaks Rosa’s heart and she has to step away from Max to let her hand hover over Liz’s back. Rosa licks her lips and stares at Liz for a long moment before she looks back at Max. “You should tell her the truth, Max. Maybe…” She shrugs helplessly. “Maybe with everything everyone knows out in the open, the _real_ truth will actually come out.”

Max inhales sharply and locks eyes with Liz. “I need to ask you something,” he says, and he moves closer to them. “I have been _pouring_ my heart out to you ever since you got back.” And Rosa snorts because a truer statement has never been said. He continues, heart in his eyes, “And I need to know. How do you truly feel about me, Liz?”

Rosa lets out a shocked noise and steps back, because they are very close and she does not want to be in the middle of that. Liz struggles to answer, but ultimately lands on, “I feel...terrified, in all kinds of ways.”

Rosa sees the defeat in Max’s eyes at that, but she can also see the sadness and regret in Liz’s. “This is so messed up,” Rosa says, burying her face in her hands.

Max nods to acknowledge Liz’s answer and bites his lip, looking down. His voice is soft when he says, “Did you believe a word that I said to you at the drive-in? Not about Rosa,” he clarifies, though even _she_ knows that’s not what he meant. “Did you believe me when I said I love you?”

“Yes,” Liz says, nodding definitively; there’s no doubt in her mind about it.

He nods and says, “Good. That’s what matters. I hope you take that with you wherever you go next.” Liz steps closer to him and he steps away. “No,” he says, shaking his head. “Goodbye, Liz.”

He sends her a small smile before he turns to leave, and Liz watches him leave with tears in her eyes. 

Rosa groans and says, “I am surrounded by emotionally-crippled idiots.”

/

Rosa loves her sister, but the way Max looked when he left, she thinks he needs her more right now, so she follows him to his Jeep, curling up in the passenger seat as he drives up to his house.

“I’m sorry you’re hurting,” she says quietly. “I’m sorry she can’t give you what you’re looking for from her right now.”

The radio hums quietly under the sound of the wind roaring in their ears as he picks up speed, kicking up dust when they turn off the main road up to his house. 

Michael and Isobel are sitting in the back of his truck outside Max’s house, talking quietly, when Max pulls up and walks over to them. “That’s it. Kyle knows about me,” he tells them, and Michael scowls. Isobel looks more frightened than ever. “Never should’ve told Liz the truth,” Max admits, sitting down with them. “Now our secret is gonna spread.”

Isobel stands up, panicked. “I don’t think I’m strong enough to change Liz’s mind, Max. And we tried. I just,” she shrugs and licks her lips. “I think we need more time.”

Michael tells her they don’t have any more time and Rosa agrees. “There’s not going to be enough time in the world for you to convince Liz there’s nothing worth staying here for,” she says, standing next to Isobel and looking up at her sadly.

“We'll figure something out,” Max states, like there has to be another way.

Michael shakes his head and says, “No. _We’re_ not gonna do anything.”

There’s a bad feeling growing in Rosa’s chest as Michael explains everyone’s looking for someone--an alien--to blame. She’s been following him around for ten years, and she knows that tone of voice. He’s feeling defeated, and he’s finally ready to give in. “No,” she says, shaking her head. “What’s going on with you? Why are you doing this?”

“I got nothing besides some old scrap metal,” he says, lips twisted in regret.

“Don’t say that!” Rosa yells, stepping forward to get in his face, hands hovering over his shoulders. “You’ve got Isobel, and I know it’s been ten years full of friction with you two, but you’ve got Max too,” she says, looking over at the both of them. She turns back to Michael, wishing she could shake some sense into him. “And you’ve got Alex. No matter what happened last night, you will always have him!”

Isobel lunges forward to grasp Michael’s knees and Rosa moves out of her way. “No, Michael, we stick together,” she says, her eyes pleading as she looks up at him.

He half-smiles down at Isobel, because he thinks he’s protecting _her_. “Liz Ortecho’s looking for a murderer,” he states, nodding his conviction in his solution to the problem. “Let’s give her one. I’m gonna confess. After all, I’m the one that killed those girls.”

Isobel looks horrified at his declaration and Rosa has to agree. “But you _didn’t_ !” Rosa yells, throwing her hands up as she paces behind Isobel. “And neither did Isobel! You’re covering for the _wrong person_!”

Max, whose hand has gravitated to grip Michael’s shoulder, shakes his head. “We’ll think of something else,” he says. 

Isobel stands up and places her hand on Michael’s neck. “Yes, we will. You’re not confessing to anything, Michael.”

“Thank you!” Rosa says, shouldering into the small group. “Listen to your siblings, Michael Guerin!”

Michael’s lips twist and he shakes his head. “Sure, and what ideas do the two of you have that we haven’t tried already?” 

Max and Isobel exchange a look and shrug, and panic continues to grow in Rosa’s chest. “Still not an option,” she says sternly.

Michael nods at their lack of answers and says, “Well, better come up with something soon, otherwise, I’m going to Liz myself.” He gently nudges Isobel out of the way and slides off the tailgate, angling to move around to the front of the truck.

Max makes a sound of disagreement and moves to reach for him. “Michael, wait.”

Michael shakes his head and turns back around. “I won’t go to her tonight, but I think we should deal with this sooner rather than later.” He lets out a long sigh and turns to Isobel. “You need me to give you a ride back?”

Isobel exchanges looks with Max, and Rosa can easily read what they’re saying: Isobel is going to convince Michael to wait while they find another solution, and Max is going to back off a little bit, because he’s definitely not going to help the situation.

Max swallows hard and steps back, nodding in agreement with Isobel. Then he looks over at Michael and says, “We’ll talk tomorrow?”

Michael nods and gets into the truck, starting it up as he waits for Isobel. 

Isobel places a reassuring hand on Max’s arm, squeezes slightly, and heads for the other side of the truck.

Rosa lets out a long breath and stands next to Max as he watches them drive away. She’s not a religious woman, but she thinks she might have to start praying to a God she’s not really sure she believes in that these three come out on the right side of this clusterfuck.


	5. Don't Speak

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Rosa spends another night restlessly pacing the hallway between Liz and her father’s rooms, biting her thumbnail as she contemplates popping in on Michael to make sure he’s not doing something stupid. The more she thinks about it, the more she worries he’ll ignore Isobel and Max’s advice and confess to a triple homicide he didn’t actually commit.
> 
> Around two in the morning she decides enough is enough, and there’s nothing actually stopping her from checking in on Michael, so she does.
> 
> He’s in bed in the Airstream, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling. His breathing is ragged, and though it’s dark, there is a glimmer of moonlight shining through the window, and she can see the faintest shimmer of tear tracks on his face. “Oh, Mikey,” she says quietly, perching next to him on the bed. “You don’t have to do this, please don’t do this.” Her hand hovers over his where it’s resting on his chest and she presses down, wishing she could give him some comfort.

Rosa spends another night restlessly pacing the hallway between Liz and her father’s rooms, biting her thumbnail as she contemplates popping in on Michael to make sure he’s not doing something stupid. The more she thinks about it, the more she worries he’ll ignore Isobel and Max’s advice and confess to a triple homicide he didn’t actually commit.

Around two in the morning she decides enough is enough, and there’s nothing actually stopping her from checking in on Michael, so she does.

He’s in bed in the Airstream, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling. His breathing is ragged, and though it’s dark, there is a glimmer of moonlight shining through the window, and she can see the faintest shimmer of tear tracks on his face. “Oh, Mikey,” she says quietly, perching next to him on the bed. “You don’t have to do this, please don’t do this.” Her hand hovers over his where it’s resting on his chest and she presses down, wishing she could give him some comfort.

Her brow furrows when she looks closer and sees something tucked under his hand. Her face clears and she sighs, heart leaping in relief when she recognizes the glossy sheen of a familiar photograph. “I know you think you’re protecting them, but they don’t want you to do it. Listen to them, Michael.”

She sits up with him until his eyes drift closed and his breathing evens out. “Don’t do anything rash,” she whispers. Her hands hover over his chest again and she closes her eyes tight, hoping beyond hope she can somehow convince him to wait.

She finally has to let out a ragged sigh and open her eyes, because it’s not like the power of optimism actually works. “Just... _wait_ , Michael Guerin,” she says sternly, pointing down at him as she stands up.

She heads back home to keep watch over her father for the rest of the night. She is relieved when his breathing stays blissfully deep and even, even as she resumes her pacing and listens to Liz tossing and turning for the rest of the night.

At least one of them will be getting a good night’s sleep.

/

Liz has an interview at the hospital the next morning, so Rosa follows her there for a chance to check in on Kyle.

They find him digging through some box, and Rosa gags and nearly leaves when she sees the way he looks at Liz. “Oh my god, Kyle, ‘wow’?” she says, rolling her eyes as she looks down into the box on the table next to him. “You’re almost as bad as Max.”

Her eyebrows shoot up when she sees some of Jim’s things, including a drawing she’d made for him way back when and a recording device, labeled with the date of her death, from the Roswell PD tip line. “Interesting,” she says, looking up at Kyle.

Liz tells Kyle he “doesn’t look so wow,” and Rosa has to smother a laugh at that. “Very classy, Liz.”

“I’ve been up all night, processing the fact that everything I knew about my dead dad was a lie,” he admits and gestures to the box. “My mom gave me this. When he died, she went through all his stuff and put anything unsavory into this box.”

Liz leans in and her hand hovers over the recording device. Rosa raises an eyebrow and says, “I don’t know how far it’s going to get you. It got Jim as far as Grant Green and a video of our floating corpses, but there’s nothing else incriminating on there. Not for Max, Michael, or Isobel, or you can bet they’d be in cells at Caulfield right now, courtesy of Jesse Manes.”

Liz’s hand shifts over to the drawing. “Rosa drew this,” she tells Kyle, sighing. “I still hoped I was wrong about them having an affair.”

Rosa’s nose scrunches up and she shakes her head. “Oh my God, please stop, that’s so gross.”

“Me too. Teenage addict with a record and the town sheriff,” Kyle says, throwing everything back into the box. “The optics are ugly.”

“Yes it _looks_ terrible, but it’s not as bad as you think,” Rosa says, pacing around behind them as Kyle shoves the box under his desk. “And I would really appreciate it if you guys would stop insinuating I was having an affair with my father, okay, it’s super creeping me out.”

“Is it okay if we maybe pump the brakes on the sleuthing for one day?” he asks Liz, avoiding eye contact with her, and that makes Rosa narrow her eyes at him. He continues softly, “My dad and your sister aren’t going to be any less dead tomorrow.” The puppy dog eyes he throws at Liz put Rosa on red alert.

Liz agrees, citing her interview as an excuse to hold off on their independent investigation, but Rosa’s known Liz almost thirty years now, and she’s been following Kyle around for the last ten. They are both lying to each other, and they are both up to something. “Fuck,” she says, standing between the two of them and watching as Kyle walks away. She looks back at Liz and makes a split second decision; Liz is going to her interview, so she’s not getting up to anything any time soon. Better to stick with Kyle.

She runs after him down the hallway, calling up to him, “If you’re going to Manes with all this, I’m going to kill you!” 

/

Rosa follows Kyle and waits outside the locker room while he changes, then dogs his steps as he heads out to his car. “What are you doing?” she asks, slipping into the passenger seat beside him. 

He takes something out of his pocket and throws it into her lap; it falls through and onto the seat beneath her. She shifts around and looks down at it, her eyes widening. “Was this in the box?” she asks, fingers hovering over the key chain. “Oh my god, you…” She shakes her head and looks over at him, swallowing hard. “Are we going to the cabin?”

She can’t fight the smile that blooms on her face when he calls up his mother and asks for directions to his dad’s old hunting cabin. Kyle thanks her and hangs up, placing his phone on the seat next to her as he heads out of town.

An unwilling giggle escapes her as they continue driving and she covers her mouth with her hands. “You might be able to figure it out today,” she says, shaking her head. She fights the smile and bites her bottom lip; it feels like her whole body is vibrating with excitement, though of course she doesn’t have a body anymore. If he can find the bunker, he might actually be able to figure out he’s her brother.

/

Kyle pulls up to the front of the cabin, and Rosa notices Alex’s jeep is absent, though that doesn’t necessarily mean he’s not here; he’s taken to parking around the back now and then. They make their way up to the porch, Rosa bouncing on the tips of her toes as Kyle glances around.

He tries the door, which is of course locked, and then he tries to open it with the key from Jim’s box. “Not gonna work, but you are _so close_ ,” Rosa says, looking over his shoulder. 

Kyle takes another long look around, and Rosa’s eyebrows raise. “No way, dude,” she says, glancing around as he peeks into the window and picks up a log. “Breaking into someone’s house? Someone who’s a vet with PTSD on top of that?” She shakes her head at him and catches movement out of the corner of her eye. She gasps in surprise and turns to put herself in front of Kyle, then has to smile at Alex as he creeps up behind him from around the corner.

Alex’s brow is furrowed, entire body tense, but when he sees it’s Kyle, he relaxes. “You could try knocking,” he says casually, and Rosa has to laugh at the look on Kyle’s face. Alex continues, “It’s less of a felony, but it’s also less dramatic, so depends on what you’re going for.”

Rosa cackles and walks over to ghost her hand over Alex’s cheek. “Glad to see a little bit of that spark back, my friend.”

Alex rolls his eyes at Kyle’s still-dumbfounded look, then tilts his head toward the door, pulling his keys out of his pocket as he does.

Once inside, Kyle glances around and tells Alex he’d forgotten about the cabin.

Alex shrugs again and asks, “You want to tell me why you drove all the way out here?”

Kyle tells Alex he just wanted to find out what happened to the cabin, while Rosa rolls her eyes at what a terrible liar her brother is.

Alex furrows his brow and tells Kyle Jim had left it to him in his will, though the way he’s looking at Kyle makes Rosa think he remembers Kyle’s old tells too. “You going to call him on it?” Rosa wonders.

She thinks Alex just might, but then Kyle nods, coming to a decision, and pulls out the key and reveals what he’s looking for. “You recognize this?”

Alex leans in to look and says, “Yeah. Keychain looks like mine, but that key’s too small for the door.”

Kyle says, “Mind if I poke around and see if I can find the lock?” Alex shoots him an incredulous look and Kyle shrugs. “Then I’ll take off.”

Rosa holds her breath and clasps her hands in front of herself as she whispers, “Please, please, please.”

Alex gives in and says, “When I got here, I put everything that reminded me of the good ol’ days in the closet.” He sends Kyle a tight smile even as Rosa snorts and rolls her eyes. “Go nuts,” he says, grabbing his drink and leaving.

/

Once he starts pulling things out of the closet, Kyle starts reminiscing instead of looking for the lock that fits the key. Normally Rosa would get frustrated and leave by this point, but she has a feeling-- or maybe it’s just a hope-- that Kyle’s going to finally learn the truth about Jim and her, and she wants to be there when it happens. So instead of leaving, she paces the room around him, eyes darting to the table every few seconds.

“I wish I could throw some of this stuff around,” she tells him. “Just to draw your attention to it.” She sighs and sits on top of the table, resting her elbows on her knees while she rakes her fingers through her hair. “Why couldn’t I have been a ghost like in _Poltergeist_? Instead I’m like Swayze in _Ghost_.”

She watches Kyle for a few more minutes, but when it becomes clear he’s not going to be going near the table any time soon, she jumps up and starts pacing again. Her circles start small, just around the room, and then get bigger until she is pacing out to the porch, where Alex is sitting on the bench just outside the door. She makes one more pass around the cabin to make sure Kyle’s not going to discover the secret without her, then sighs and goes out to sit next to Alex.

“I hate this,” she tells him, not for the first time. “I hate feeling so helpless, and I hate standing here with all the answers right in front of you and not being heard.”

Alex is staring off into the distance, eyes aimed at Kyle’s car, though his gaze seems much farther away. His right hand is rhymically squeezing his leg just above his knee, though she doesn’t think he’s doing it consciously. 

“Rough day?” she asks him quietly.

He continues to squeeze his leg, breathing in and out slowly.

Rosa sighs and tilts her head so it’s resting just above his shoulder. “Yeah, me too.”

/

A couple minutes later Alex sighs and runs a hand down his face. “Kyle fucking Valenti,” he murmurs as he stands up and turns to head back inside.

Rosa hums and says, “Pretty sure his middle name is Manuel, actually,” as she follows him inside.

Kyle is just where she left him, sitting up against the wall and reminiscing over the old garbage Alex had thrown in the closet.

“That’s not a lock,” Alex points out, sounding a little irritated with Kyle, even going so far as to give him the Eyebrows of Sass.

Rosa rolls her eyes when Kyle, oblivious to Alex’s irritation, reminds him of their childhood friendship. “Dude, I think you’re purposefully forgetting a significant part of your shared youth here. Alex did not have the same upbringing you did.”

“We were a good team,” Kyle says with a smile.

The look on Alex’s face...Rosa buries her head in her hands and groans. “Oh my God, Kyle. Just stop, please. He is not in the mood.”

“Yeah,” Alex agrees, and Rosa’s nose scrunches as she hears the derision in his voice.

“Until you grew one chest hair and instantly became a nightmare of a bully,” he points out. “Like some bro jock from an 80’s movie.”

Kyle’s smile fades and his lips tighten. “I don’t know why I was like that,” he says quietly, head hanging in shame.

“Because I was gay,” Alex says plainly. “People started to notice, and you were afraid that, if you were nice to me, people would think you were gay, too.”

Rosa sits on top of the table between them and sighs, saying, “Yeah, but he’s not that guy anymore, Alex. He’s become a good man.”

Kyle apologizes and Alex scoffs. “I don’t know if you’ve noticed,” he says, gesturing vaguely down to his leg. “But I’ve been through a lot worse than your locker room taunting at this point.” 

Kyle squirms guiltily, which is warranted, given how he’d treated Alex in their high school years, but Rosa also feels for him because there is true regret and remorse in his eyes. “Give it time, Kyle,” she says quietly as she watches him nod in acknowledgement of Alex’s point and stand up.

Polite Alex is officially gone. “How much longer do you think this is gonna take?” he asks pointedly.

Rosa turns back to Kyle just as he pulls the drawer out of the table she’s sitting on and her breath hitches.

“Whoa,” he says, looking down through the table, and Rosa scrambles off of it, coming up next to him to see the door to the bunker.

“Oh my god,” she whispers, unable to tamp down on her excitement again. “You found it.”

Kyle enlists Alex’s help to move the coffee table to reveal the door to Jim’s bunker.

“What the hell?” Alex says, eyes wide.

“Did you know about this?” Kyle asks, kneeling down to run his hand over the door.

“No, dude,” Alex says, the incredulity clear in his voice. When Kyle starts messing with the door, intending to open it, he continues, “Okay, so this is the point in the horror movie where the audience starts screaming, ‘No, don’t do that!’”

Rosa laughs and shakes her head. “I’m your only audience, babe, and I say, open the fucking door!” She’s bouncing on her toes between them, hands shaking in her excitement.

“What’s the worst thing we can find?” Kyle reasons, looking up at Alex.

Alex, ever the practical one, says, “What? _Literal_ skeletons!”

Rosa snorts and says, “No, just metaphorical ones.”

Kyle is undeterred. He twists the locks to open them, even as Alex shakes his head in disbelief above him. Kyle pulls open the door and they both look down into darkness.

They both look up at each other, eyes wide. Kyle’s eyes keep darting back to the ladder and Alex shakes his head. “No way, dude.”

Rosa claps her hands and dances on her toes between them. “Yes way, dude!”

Kyle huffs out a breath and says, “Come on, you’re not the least bit curious?”

Alex rolls his eyes and says, “Of course I am, but again, by horror movie rules, one--or more likely _both_ \--of us _will_ be gruesomely killed down there.”

Rosa holds up a finger in triumph, unable to stand still in her excitement. “Ah, but it’s not a horror movie, it’s a sci-fi movie. Completely different secret bunker rules!”

Kyle shakes his head and crosses his arms over his chest. “One, this is not a horror movie, and two, do you really think my dad would have left you a house with a murder basement?”

“At this point,” Alex says, gesturing down to the surprise bunker door, “Anything is possible.”

Kyle shrugs and says nonchalantly, “Fine. I’ll go by myself.”

Alex’s lips tighten and his eyes narrow on Kyle. “You’re just trying to goad me into coming with you.”

Kyle smiles brightly and says, “Is it working?”

Alex rolls his eyes and tilts his chin at the ladder. “You first. If it is booby trapped, I can just close the door again and no one will be the wiser about what happened to you.”

“Gee, thanks,” Kyle says, grimacing as he starts down the ladder.

/

Rosa meets them at the bottom, squinting into the darkness before Kyle flips on the light, takes in the decor, and says, “I think I’d prefer skeletons.”

Rosa snorts and crosses her arms over her chest as she steps farther into the room. “Okay, I know this looks like a human trafficking nightmare, or a creepy kidnap-y basement, but I swear it’s not. Just,” she shrugs, looking back at them and licking her lips. “Please, _please_ keep poking around.”

Kyle starts looking over the desk and Alex eyes him thoughtfully. “Why did you really come here?”

Rosa ghosts her hands over the items on the desk, then over the door to the wardrobe, willing them to start opening things as Kyle tells Alex he’s looking into Rosa’s death.

“The DUI?” Alex asks, and his tone is so matter-of-fact it breaks Rosa’s heart. Like there’s no doubt in his mind that’s what it was, because Rosa was an addict and of course she’d kill herself and two other girls with her recklessness.

“You think your dad had something to do with it?” Alex asks, and his tone is much more disbelieving at that.

“I think Rosa and my dad were having an affair,” Kyle says, kneeling down to inspect the bedside table.

Rosa sees Alex’s brain short-circuit at that and has to laugh. “No,” he says, shaking his head. “Your dad was a good guy.”

Kyle just stares at him, and Rosa knows this has been weighing on him so heavily he’s not about to believe it based on Alex’s assertion.

Alex says, a little quieter, “You know why he left me this house, and not you?”

Kyle tilts his head to the side, waiting for Alex to continue, and Rosa makes a noise to encourage him.

“Because you were fine,” Alex explains. “You were popular. You were at the top of your class in med school.” He swallows hard before he says, “Your mom loved you.”

Rosa hums sadly and walks over to him, placing her hand over Alex’s shoulder as he continues. “I wasn’t loved. My mom was gone. My dad was a homphobic, abusive dick.” His voice cracks a little, and Rosa leans her forehead just over his shoulder, arms coming around him. “And your dad saw it. He left me these keys so that I would have a place to go.” He shakes his head and says, “He wasn’t the type of person who would take advantage of a desperate teenager. He would help them.”

Kyle inhales deeply, and Rosa turns to look at him. “Believe it, Kyle, please. Just a little longer, until you finish searching down here and find what I need you to find.”

Alex’s eyes skip around the room, trying to figure out how a secret bunker equates to a helping hand, and his eyes stop on the armoire. 

“Yes,” Rosa says, stepping away from him as he walks toward it, her excitement building again.

Alex pulls it open and takes a second to look over the contents, pulling out a bag of fluid and saying, “Look,” as he holds it out to Kyle.

Kyle checks the label and says, “This is for detoxing.”

Rosa claps her hands and stands between them, nodding vigorously as Kyle posits that Jim kept her in there to get clean.

His tone turns rueful as he continues, “Or maybe I’m just thinking wishfully again and I need to get a grip.”

“No, no, no, you’re not! You’re completely right, just _keep looking_ , please!” Rosa says, moving over to stand on top of the chest at the foot of the bed. “Please!”

Alex starts looking around again, and Rosa screams and jumps up onto the bed when he kneels down in front of the chest and starts inspecting it. “Yes, yes, yes,” she chants, bouncing up and down on the bed.

Kyle pulls the key out of his pocket and kneels down next to Alex to open the chest. Rosa drops flat to her stomach and crawls to the end of the bed, looking down into the chest as they open it and start looking around.

There, right on top of some old baby blankets and toys is a picture of her as a baby, nestled in Jim’s arms. Rosa’s smile feels like it’s going to crack her face in half. She looks up at Kyle as he picks up the picture and recognizes that it’s Jim, watches his nostalgic smile drop as he realizes...

“My dad didn’t have an affair with Liz’s sister,” Kyle says slowly, the truth finally dawning on him. “He had an affair with her mom.” The realization spills from his lips quickly. “That’s why he was trying to help Rosa sober up. That’s why he was never the same after she died.” Then the words get stuck in his throat and he barely manages to choke out, “Rosa was his daughter.”

Rosa sits up abruptly and buries her face in her hands, laughing hysterically while tears stream down her face. “I thought you’d never know!” she says, shaking her head. She looks up at his devastated face and her smile fades a little. “I know, I know. I know it’s a shock, but--” She shrugs and her smile brightens again. “You’re my brother!” She kneels on the bed and leans forward to place her palms just above his chest. “You’re my _brother_ ,” she says again, another tear sliding down her cheek.

Kyle swallows hard and murmurs, “She was _my_ sister, too.”

She sees Alex nod out of the corner of her eye and turns to watch him as he eyes Kyle carefully. “Are you okay?”

Kyle shakes his head and shrugs. “I don’t know,” he says quietly, not looking up at Alex. 

Rosa slides off the bed and stands in Kyle’s space, wrapping herself around him as much as she can when she can’t actually touch him. She looks down, sees the watch on his wrist, and sucks in a breath.

“Fuck,” she says, pulling away from Kyle a little to look over at Alex, biting her lip. It’s been at least twelve hours since she saw Michael, and she’d meant to check in on him earlier, lest he go confess to crimes he didn’t commit. “Will you take care of him for me?” she asks Alex.

When Alex takes a few hesitant steps closer to Kyle and places his hand on his shoulder, Rosa steps away with a nod. “Thank you,” she says, and leaves to find Michael.

/

He’s with Max and Isobel, thank God, though… She tilts her head as she takes in the fact that they’re out in the middle of nowhere and Isobel’s sitting in the back of Michael’s truck in nothing but her nightie. “What the fuck happened to you?” she asks.

She turns to Michael when he says, holding a hand out to Max, “We were just trying to protect the secret, Max.”

Isobel jumps in with, “You were all smitten and messed up and you wanted to tell Liz.” They both sound panicked.

Rosa’s eyebrows shoot up when Max, tears in his eyes and rage in his voice, says, “I wasn’t smitten. I _loved_ her.”

“Okay, what the fuck did I miss?” Rosa asks, stepping between them, Isobel at her back.

“How was I supposed to know that?” Isobel asks.

“I don’t know, Isobel,” Max sneers, voice raising in his rage. “Maybe if you were a damn mind reader!”

They all take a second to breathe and Rosa steps back to look between all three of them. “What the hell is going on with you three! You were all on the same page yesterday!”

“I thought you had a crush,” Isobel tells Max. “A dangerous one that could threaten all of our lives, including yours.”

Michael steps in, slightly in front of Isobel, ever ready to jump to her defense. “And you’ve made the rules our entire lives. ‘Never be extraordinary.’ Just once, we made a game-time decision. It was for your own good.”

And suddenly, Rosa realizes. “He found out you sent Liz away,” she murmurs with a nod, watching as Max turns away from them and takes some space.

“You lied for ten years!” Max yells, his rage still simmering dangerously.

Isobel’s voice shakes while she tries to explain, “Sometimes you keep things from the people that you love to protect them.” Rosa sucks in a breath and shakes her head when she sees the panic rising in Isobel’s eyes, because she knows whatever she says next is not going to be good. Isobel continues, “Hey, kind of like how you’ve been lying to the love of your life about this little murder thing. You know? Rosa and her friends?”

Rosa winces and rears back a little. “Yeah, probably not the best thing to say to him right now,” she murmurs.

Max’s voice breaks a little but the anger is still there when he steps closer to Isobel again and says, “Ever since Liz drove away, I have _never_ been happy, not once!” He takes a shuddery breath. “I have been idling because I didn’t think I _deserved_ a goodbye.” There are tears in his eyes, but he pulls himself together enough to say, “And do you know what got me out of bed in the morning? How much I _loved_ you two.”

The venomous glance he throws between Michael and Isobel and the pointed way he emphasizes the word ‘loved’ is about enough for Rosa. “Hey!” she yells, moving to stand in front of him. “I know you’re mad, but you don’t have to be such a jackass about it!”

When Max shoves Michael into the side of his truck, hard, Rosa raises her fists and snarls at him. “Max, stop it!” She tries to shove herself between them, tries to push him back, but he’s already moving away, toward Isobel.

“No!” Rosa says, keeping herself between them, hands on her hips while she yells up at Max. “You don’t get to yell at her like this!”

He asks Isobel where Liz is and she shakes her head and says, panicking, “I don’t know. How would I know?”

“You got into her head a couple days ago. The connection is still there. Find her, Isobel!” he yells, slamming his hand next to her on the tailgate.

“Stop it, Max! You’re being an asshole!” Rosa yells up at him. “Stop scaring them, they’re your family!”

Isobel gasps behind her and Max leans in, eyebrows furrowed in concern. “What? Wha-What is it?” he asks.

Rosa turns around and looks down at Isobel. “Is?”

“She’s in trouble,” Isobel says.

“What?” Rosa asks, shaking her head, but Max is already demanding the keys to Michael’s truck.

“I’ll meet you there,” Rosa says to him, and she disappears to Liz’s side.

/

Liz is crouched under a table in a dark room Rosa doesn’t immediately recognize. Rosa slides down next to her and whispers, “What’s going on?”

A chill runs through her when she hears the sound of empty shell casings hitting the cement floor way too close to them. “What the fuck did you get yourself into, Elizabeth?” Rosa hisses, standing up to investigate where the person with the gun is.

An old-timey sounding radio broadcast starts up several feet away from them, and Rosa hears the gunman making their way over toward the sound. Rosa turns a corner and sees Wyatt Long creeping along through the aisles of alien artefacts, gun primed to start shooting at her sister again. “You fucking prick!” she yells, fists clenched at her sides as she follows him. “It wasn’t enough you almost killed her at the Crashdown that night? You had to come and finish the job today?”

Wyatt finds the source of the broadcast and Rosa sucks in a breath when she sees Liz creeping up behind him wielding a large alien figurine as a weapon. “No, just run, Liz!” she whispers, but it’s too late. Liz is swinging at Wyatt, and she gets in a few good hits before he knocks her to the ground.

“Liz!” Rosa yells, falling to her knees next to her sister. Liz’s eyes are closed, but she’s breathing. She’s just been knocked out cold. Rosa stands up again, keeping her body between Wyatt and Liz. “I’ll kill you!” she yells at him, snarling.

He shakes his head and looks down at Liz, cocking his head. “You always were the less impressive Ortecho sister,” he says.

A chill runs through Rosa and her eyes widen. The way he speaks, and the way he’s prowling around Liz’s body, looking down at her like she’s nothing... “Noah?” 

There’s a sound deeper in the warehouse and both of their gazes snap toward it. Wyatt--Noah--takes off after it, leaving Liz passed out on the floor. Rosa drops to her knees again, fitting her palm on Liz’s cheek. “Lizzie, you have to wake up,” she begs, licking her lips as she runs her eyes down Liz’s body to check for any major injuries. “Lizzie, _please_.” Her hands hover over Liz’s shoulders; she wants to shake her sister awake so badly.

Rosa screams and ducks down, throwing her body over Liz’s when she hears a gunshot from somewhere further inside the warehouse. “Liz!” she yells down at her sister, eyes filling with tears. “Liz, please wake up!”

She’s sobbing, body draped over Liz’s, when Wyatt--fuck, when _Noah_ comes back, face blank, and kneels down next to Liz’s head. “If you hurt her,” Rosa says, voice low and dangerous. “I will find a way to kill you, I swear it.”

She sucks in a breath when he purses his lips, eyes travelling around the warehouse. Finally, he holds his hand out and uses his powers to empty several boxes and stack them into towers just outside the building. “What the fuck are you doing?” Rosa asks, following him just far enough to keep an eye trained on Liz as he prepares whatever it is he’s preparing.

He walks back into the recesses of the warehouse and comes back a minute later, the dead body of Grant Green trailing behind him. Rosa sucks in a breath and drops down next to Liz again. “Wake _up_ ,” she murmurs, keeping her eyes trained on Noah as he heads back outside.

Rosa startles when Liz’s body starts moving toward the entrance as well, and she looks up to see Noah lifting a hand in her direction and dragging her outside. Rosa leaps up and keeps herself between Noah and her sister’s floating body. She hears Liz groan and her gaze snaps over to her, but Noah is already lowering her into a crate and nailing it shut. “No!” Rosa yells, trying to dig her fingers into the wood siding, trying to rip it off, but it’s useless.

Once Liz is securely trapped inside the crate, Noah heads back into the warehouse and returns with a large canister of gasoline. 

“No!” Rosa yells, screaming with frustration when she tries to dig her fingers into the side of the crate but finds no purchase. “Liz!” she yells, trying to bang on the side of the crate. “Liz, you have to wake up now, _please_!”

Noah starts covering all the crates in gas, including the one Liz is in, and Rosa hears her cough and wake up. “Liz, come on! You have to get out of there!” she yells through the slats in the wood, even as Noah is demanding Liz tell him who she’s told, presumably about the aliens.

“I’ll tell you everything,” Liz yells, voice cracking in fear. “Just let me out first, please!”

“Please!” Rosa yells over at him. “Noah, let her go!”

He continues to pour the gasoline around, then steps back and pulls out a lighter.

“No!” Rosa screams, turning back to the crate Liz is trapped in and trying to bang on the side again. “Liz, come on, you gotta get out of there!”

Flames erupt around her and she fists her hands, bringing them down on the side of the crate in desperation. “Liz!” Rosa hears her sister scream in fear and anger, and she screams back, tears streaming down her face.

Moments after the whole crate is engulfed in flames, Liz kicks out the side and crawls out, jumping up and immediately running for her car.

“No, wait!” Rosa yells after her, because Noah had poured a trail of gasoline over to her car.

Liz is thrown back as her car explodes and Rosa crouches down next to her, wishing she could grab her arm to help her up, but all she can do is keep a lookout for Noah.

They get up and take off running, and Rosa lets out a scream when Max pops up from behind a stack of crates to grab Liz. “Thank god,” Rosa says, tears still streaming down her face. 

“Are you okay?” Max asks her, voice wobbly when Liz throws her arms around him and squeezes tight.

“Throw in an extra squeeze for me,” Rosa says, hovering close to Liz’s back while Max covers her in front.

Liz pulls back and tells him, “It’s Wyatt Long.”

“Is there anyone else here?” Max asks, pulling out a gun and going into cop mode.

“Grant Green,” Liz tells him, and Rosa shakes her head and sucks in a breath. 

“Follow me. Stay close,” Max tells her, leading with his gun, eyes sweeping around as they leave their spot behind the crates. Rosa follows behind Liz; she’s had ten years to get used to the fact that her body isn’t actually there, but death hasn’t quite overwritten the instinct to protect her sister’s vulnerable side.

They come across Grant’s body almost right away, presumably set up as a decoy to draw their attention away from Noah, but they start moving again soon enough, Max and Rosa keeping Liz between the two of them.

Noah comes out from around the corner and starts shooting, and Max starts shooting back. Noah’s second shot hits Max, but he does hit Noah in Wyatt’s body in return as he goes down. Rosa rushes forward, dropping to her knees next to Max on the opposite side as Liz.

Liz’s hands press down on his wound and she apologizes to him, crying and shaking him to keep him awake, but Rosa just shakes her head, brings her fists down on his chest, and snarls, “If you die before all of this gets figured out, I’ll kill you!”

/

The EMTs stabilize Max on the way to the hospital. Rosa rides with him the whole way and watches the EMTs place every bandage into a hazards bag, ready to be disposed of safely at the hospital. She breathes a little easier and sees Max does as well. His color has even come back a little by the time they arrive.

Rosa’s antsy; how are they going to pull out the bullet and stitch up his wound without finding out he’s an alien? 

Max is less nervous. He checks himself out of the hospital against the EMTs’, doctors’ and nurses’ strong advice against it and calls an Uber to pick him up, all before Sheriff Valenti can arrive to order him to stay. 

Rosa stays with him throughout the ride, watching the way he grimaces in pain every time the car hits a bump, and there are a lot of those on the road up to his house. Sweat drips down his temples and he looks dead white again by the time the driver pulls up to his house. “You sure you’re alright, buddy?” the driver asks, eyeing him up and down as he shifts slowly out of the car.

Max merely grunts his thanks and heads inside. The driver shrugs and drives away.

What follows is one of the most horrifying and disgusting events Rosa has ever witnessed, and she watched her own murder cover-up.

“This is why you need Isobel and Michael. You can’t do it all on your own, Max,” she says, eyes filling with tears when he screams in pain as he tries to pull the bullet out.

She can’t tell if he passes out a couple times, or if he’s just laying down to rest between bouts of digging for a bullet in his own arm and sewing up the hole, but it takes Max a long time to take care of the wound himself. The copious amount of whiskey he consumes as he’s doing it could also be a contributing factor.

He’s just finished when they hear a knock on his door, and they look over to see Liz’s silhouette outside.

Rosa lets out a slow breath and says, “Good. She can take a look at you.”

Liz is gasping as she walks in, like she rushed over. “I went to the hospital. They said you left.” She looks at everything on the coffee table and says, a little incredulously, “Did you do self-surgery?”

“I’m not wired like you. I can’t have doctors finding out,” Max explains, sitting back down on the couch with a heavy sigh and taking another long drink straight from the bottle of whiskey. “This thing doesn’t make any sense,” he says with a sigh. “Wyatt is a racist with a chip on his shoulder, but he’s also a coward. A-and murdering Grant Green, going after you…” He shakes his head.

“Yeah, no shit it doesn’t make any sense,” Rosa mutters, watching as Liz sits down next to Max and asks to look at his wound. “That’s because it wasn’t Wyatt.”

“You’re obviously in a lot of pain,” Liz tells him, eyes flickering between his eyes and the wound.

Max sniffles and looks over at her. “Why are you here?”

“You showed up when _I_ needed _you_ , so…” Liz shrugs.

Max smiles a little and looks away. Rosa rolls her eyes and says, “So you should let her look at your arm, Max.”

Liz grabs the whiskey and takes a swig straight out of the bottle, eyes tearing up. “I was terrified tonight,” she says.

“Me too,” Rosa whispers, sitting down on the table in front of them.

Max watches Liz put the bottle back on the table and shrugs a little. “Yeah, you had that weasel pointing a gun at you, so…”

“Not for me,” Liz interrupts, shaking her head. Understanding dawns in Max’s eyes and he nods to her. Liz reaches forward to take his hand and says quietly, “You know, when you showed up, I knew I was safe. I knew it in my _bones_.”

Rosa smiles, a small twist of her lips, and nods. “Trust your instincts, Liz. He’d never hurt you.”

Liz pulls away from Max and says, regret in her voice, “But my gut still tells me not to trust you. How does that make any logical sense?”

Rosa sighs and stands up to pace on the other side of the table. “Because love isn’t logical, Liz. Haven’t you learned that by now?” she says.

“The heart isn’t logical, Liz,” Max says, looking over at her.

Rosa throws her hands in his direction. “See?”

Max tears his gaze from Liz’s and looks blindly across the room as he continues, “I mean, love makes you do...crazy things. It makes you do beautiful things. And terrible things.”

Rosa watches as Liz’s gaze whips up to his face, eyes sharpening. Rosa can’t help mouthing, “Oh shit.”

Max finishes by nearly whispering, “Things you’d never do.”

Liz’s brow furrows and her voice is scratchy when she shakes her head and says, “You’re not talking about me.”

Max looks up at her, resignation and guilt in his eyes, and Rosa says aloud, “Oh _shit_.”

“You’re talking about someone else,” Liz guesses, though her tone is sure. Max practically confirms it when he looks away from her. “Is this about Rosa?” she asks. “Max?”

Max shakes his head a little, not meeting Liz’s eyes, but she doesn’t need him to confirm.

“You didn’t cover up my sister’s murder because you killed her,” Liz says. “You covered it up because someone you love did.”

Max squirms, still not meeting Liz’s eyes. Rosa sits on the table between them again and places each of her hands above one of their knees.

“Those...The three bodies. Floating out of the cave, that was Michael,” Liz concludes, and her words start running together and tripping over each other as she pieces the clues together. “He...He-he couldn’t move them be…” She holds up her hands, remembering. “His hand, it was broken then, wasn’t it? So, h-he moved them with his...mind.”

Max finally looks over at her, shaking his head in confusion. “How do you know about the cave?”

Rosa’s brows, drawn in confusion with the same question, smooth out. “You got Grant Green to show you the video before he died,” she says.

Liz pulls a little farther away from him and reaches into her back pocket. “You have no idea how much I know,” she says, unfolding the picture of Rosa’s real autopsy and placing it on the table in front of Max, right where Rosa herself is sitting.

Max looks down at the photograph, eyes wide with shock, and pulls it a little closer. “The mark. How is that possible?”

Liz looks down at the photograph too, and her breathing becomes even more ragged. “That’s not your hand,” she says, and she jumps up from the couch, eyes wet with tears again. She holds her own hand up to her mouth. “Yours is too big. And-and-and-and-and Michael’s was broken then!”

Rosa takes a shuddering breath and stands, reaching for Liz. She looks back at Max, and his gaze is still fixed on the photograph, though she doesn’t think he’s really looking at it anymore.

“So that is why you have... you’ve covered all of this up!” Liz’s voice is getting louder as she thinks she’s figured it out. “That is, that is why you have been _lying_ all of this time. Because the person that you love most in the world is the one who did it.” Her voice keeps breaking until she finally yells at Max, “Tell the truth, for once! It was Isobel, wasn’t it?”

Max shudders, tears filling his eyes while he clenches his jaw, trying to keep himself from crying.

“No,” Rosa whispers, her hand hovering over Liz’s arm, but her eyes fixed on Max.

He finally looks up at Liz and says, voice broken, “Yes.”

Rosa’s head whips around to look at Liz again. “No! It wasn’t!”

Liz, tears streaming down her face, says, voice cold, “What happened that night, Max?”

And then he tells her everything he knows about the events leading up to Rosa’s murder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to insidiousintent for help with this chapter!
> 
> I used transcripts.foreverdreaming.org for help with episode dialogue again.
> 
> Also, the next chapter is going to be a lot different than the first five (ghost!Rosa can't exactly stalk everyone in a flashback), so it may take longer than anticipated. I've got a very clear idea of what I want to do, but I don't know if I'll get it done within the week...


	6. Smells Like Teen Spirit

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Five minutes ago, Rosa was furious. She arrived at her cave, looking for her backpack and her ticket out of Roswell, only to discover them missing.
> 
> Isobel Evans was a flaky bitch who only wanted to be her friend when she was off her meds, or whatever that girl’s deal was. Her father was a helicopter parent who gave her no room to figure things out on her own. Her mom was a lying whore, and so, apparently, was her biological father. Half the people in town hated her just because she was Mexican, and the other half looked down on her because she had the audacity to “give in to stereotypes” and prove the racists right. Which, what the fuck ever. As soon as she could find her damn go bag, she’d be one less thing for all of them to worry about.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lol remember last A/N when I said this chapter might take longer? Psych! This was the fastest I've ever written a chapter.
> 
> Anyways, I adore this chapter and I hope you guys do too. Many thanks to estel_willow for looking it over for me!

**June 2008**

Five minutes ago, Rosa was furious. She arrived at her cave, looking for her backpack and her ticket out of Roswell, only to discover them missing.

Isobel Evans was a flaky bitch who only wanted to be her friend when she was off her meds, or whatever that girl’s deal was. Her father was a helicopter parent who gave her no room to figure things out on her own. Her mom was a lying whore, and so, apparently, was her biological father. Half the people in town hated her just because she was Mexican, and the other half looked down on her because she had the audacity to “give in to stereotypes” and prove the racists right. Which, what the fuck ever. As soon as she could find her damn go bag, she’d be one less thing for all of them to worry about.

Four minutes ago, she thought she heard something going on outside the cave, but she was honestly too drunk and pissed off to care.

Frederico or Jasmine or Kate; whoever it was, screw them. None of them gave a shit about _her_ , they just wanted her for what she could get for them: pills or weed or booze or her body. Fuck every last one of them.

Three minutes ago, Isobel walked in and started talking like a crazy (well, craz _ier_ ) person, telling Rosa she’d never let anything hurt her again.

Yeah, okay, whatever. For someone who was only ever around _sometimes_ and refused to acknowledge her in public, she sure could talk a big game.

Two minutes ago, she was legitimately frightened when Isobel said she’d killed Kate and Jasmine for her.

Which. _What?_ What the _fuck_?

But it’s fine, because one minute ago, she told Isobel she’d go with her, and when Isobel had pulled her back against her body and placed her hand over Rosa’s mouth, whispering a bunch of fucking _nonsense_ into her ear, Rosa had kicked out with her left leg and elbowed Isobel in the stomach, causing the blonde bitch to drop to the ground so Rosa could jump away from her.

Now, she sees someone enter the cave out of the corner of her eye, but she’s too busy screaming down at Isobel’s unconscious form. “You crazy _bitch_!” She pulls her foot back to kick Isobel’s unprotected stomach, only for her foot to pass straight through Isobel’s body.

Her brows furrow and her jaw drops open in surprise, because that’s not how that was supposed to happen. Her foot should have connected with the psychopath’s stomach. She shakes her head to try to clear it, even though she feels more sober than she has in years, and she catches something out of the corner of her eye. She chokes on air and a surprised sound is pulled from the center of her chest because it turns out...

One minute ago, she died.

/

Max Evans rushes in and immediately drops to Isobel’s side, checking her pulse and yelling at Michael Guerin not to just stand there.

Rosa’s paralyzed, staring down at her own body, mind blank. Five minutes ago she was throwing things around this cave, looking for her backpack. Five minutes ago she was ready to head out of town to get clean for good. Five minutes ago, she was alive, and now… she’s not?

She shakes her head and kneels down next to her… next to her body? That she’s not in anymore, because she’s...dead? _What_?

She’s vaguely aware of Max and Michael talking to each other somewhere behind her, but she’s still kneeling in front of her own body, hands hovering over her chest, eyes on her face. “What the fuck is happening?” she whispers, hands shaking as she tries to press down, breathing becoming more rapid when they just sink through her shirt until she’s wrist-deep in her own chest. “What the fuck!”

Max is suddenly there, two fingers pressed to her neck as he searches for her pulse, but she shakes her head and says, “I don’t think you’re going to find anything there, asshole. I think your sister just killed me.”

She jumps up and presses both hands over her mouth, shaking her head. “No, no, no, no, no.” Her eyes dart around the cave, not landing on anything in particular, but definitely avoiding what’s happening at her feet. She tunes Max out again, staring straight ahead at her art on the walls, until she feels a weird jolt go through her whole body and Max starts screaming at her feet.

She looks down and sees his hand on her body’s chest, glowing red. “What the fuck?” Rosa yells, dropping down next to him, hands pushing towards him to shove him away from her, but of course her hands just pass through his chest. 

His hand stops glowing and he leans away from her body, sweat pouring down his face. He takes a few deep breaths and leans in again, and his hand starts glowing again. When it does, Rosa feels another jolt go through her, and the high it gives her is better than any pill she’s ever taken. She watches Max’s face as he concentrates hard on something she can’t see, but the longer he does it, the better Rosa feels.

She closes her eyes and inhales through her nose, and she swears her heart stutters, but Max starts screaming again, and she startles, opening her eyes.

“No, no, no! Please!” he yells.

“Why can’t you heal her, Max?” Michael yells from behind them.

Rosa’s attention whips back to Max, eyes wide. “Can you do that? Can you save me?”

Max is crying. “I’ve never brought somebody back from the dead before!” he yells at Michael.

A sob escapes Rosa’s mouth and her eyes fill with tears. She shakes her head. “You can’t do it, can you?”

Michael’s telling Max they need to get out of there and call someone. “We can call the police!” he suggests.

Rosa’s immediate reaction is to stand and take a step back, shake her head, and say, “No!” The police have always meant judgment and juvie and the threat of her father’s deportation, but… She steps forward again as she reconsiders. Right now, the police mean Jim and Isobel in jail for what she’s done and closure for her family. 

But Max has already vetoed that course of action, claiming it wasn’t really Isobel that had killed her.

“Yes it was!” Rosa snarls, dropping to her knees next to Max again and raising her fists to rain them down on his back. “Yes it was, and she deserves prison for what she did to me!”

Just like that, Michael gives in to Max and moves on. “We can’t just leave the bodies here,” he says, and he and Max decide to cover up what really happened.

“No!” Rosa yells, scrambling up, wiping her face with her sleeve. She hadn’t even realized she was crying. “You can’t!”

But they do.

/

Her stomach heaves as she watches Michael direct her and Kate and Jasmine’s bodies down the hill toward her car, but she supposes, with a kind of detached horror, that she can’t really throw up when she no longer has a live body to inhabit.

She tries her hardest to hit them, swinging her fists at their arms and backs as they all make their way down the hill, but it’s useless. Evans and Guerin are going to cover up her murder to protect that bitch Isobel and she can’t do anything to stop them.

When Isobel shows up and says she doesn’t remember what happened, Rosa tries to do the same to her. She bunches her hand into a fist and walks up to the girl, snarling as she takes her swing. “You killed me! You suffocated me or used your freaky mutant powers or _something_ to end my fucking life, and you _don’t_ _remember doing it_?!”

Her fists pass through Isobel’s horrified face as Michael tells her _he_ killed Jasmine, Kate, and Rosa, so Rosa turns on him again. “Really? You’re going to take the blame for what this Jason Dean motherfucker did to us?”

Apparently he is, because he sticks with the story and Max lets him. “Assholes,” Rosa snarls at them, crossing her arms over her chest while she watches them set everything up to stage a car crash.

They stand in a row in the middle of the road, facing her car with the three bodies in it, but Rosa stands and faces the three of them, her back to her car. “I hate you,” she says, rage making her voice shake, tears streaming down her face.

The car passes them and the three of them turn to watch it, but Rosa’s eyes stay on Isobel. “I hope you rot in hell, you evil bitch.”

**June 2008**

The first time she apparates (for lack of a better term), she’s sitting in the back of Max’s jeep on the way back from her staged accident. She’d been so focused on the immediate impact of her death on herself, but as they’re driving back into Roswell, her breath catches as she thinks about what this is going to do to her father, to Liz.

The hurt is so visceral when she thinks about the impact her death will have on each of them that she feels herself go weightless, a strange feeling, though she’s been dead for hours at this point. Seconds later, she’s sitting on the floor of her bedroom, at Liz’s feet as her sister bites her lip and smiles down at her AP Bio book on the desk in front of her.

“Liz!” Rosa half-yells, scrambling up to grab her sister’s shoulders and pull her in for a hug, but her hands pass through her. Rosa chokes on a sob and tears spring to her eyes as she looks down at Liz, whose eyes are far away as she taps her pen on an empty notebook page, humming _First Day of My Life_ by Bright Eyes.

Rosa wipes her face and sits down on the desk next to Liz, watches the blush bloom on her face as she continues humming the song, thoughts obviously far away from AP Bio from the goofy grin that spreads across her face every few minutes and the total lack of notes she’s taking. Her eyes stay on Liz’s face for the next hour, until red and blue lights start flashing outside Liz’s window and a knock comes on their door downstairs. “I’m so sorry, Lizzie,” she whispers.

/

Rosa spends the next week in bed next to Liz. They have a steady trickle of people who crawl in next to them including Maria and Alex, who both look just as wrecked as Liz, Mimi, who hesitates to crawl in with them for some reason when it’s never stopped her before, and of course their dad, who with Rosa, brackets Liz every night as she cries herself to sleep.

It’s not until the day of her funeral, when she hears Arturo mention the sheriff’s request to come to the funeral to Mimi, that Rosa even thinks about Jim. She’s been sitting on the floor outside the bathroom waiting for Liz, but she stands at the mention of her other dad, eyes filling with tears for the umpteenth time as she thinks about the impact her death must have had on him. Her thoughts of Jim overwhelm her, and she feels that weightless feeling again, and then she’s suddenly standing in the middle of the sheriff’s office, staring down at Jim as he gently runs a finger over a drawing she’d given him ages ago.

She startles at the sudden change in scenery and stumbles back. “What? No! Liz still needs me!” she says aloud, panicking because Liz had hardly been able to get out of bed this morning; she doesn’t know how she’s going to make it to the funeral.

And there’s that weightless feeling again, lifting her up and dropping her back into the bathroom she’s shared with Liz her entire life. Liz is standing at the sink, wrapped in a towel and staring down at the lotion and other products Maria had helpfully laid out for her on the counter. Her chest is heaving and her eyes look distant, hand hovering over the line of products but not reaching down for any.

“Liz?” Rosa whispers, hand reaching out for her sister’s arm.

There’s a knock on the door that startles them both. Rosa drops her hand and Liz shakes her head and picks up the lotion. “You alright in there, kid?” Mimi calls through the door.

Liz snorts and shakes her head as she starts getting ready. “I’ll be out in a few minutes,” she calls back, not answering the question.

Mimi’s quiet for a long moment before she says, “Okay. Let me know if you need anything.”

Rosa sits on the closed toilet and watches Liz get ready for her funeral, thinking about what just happened. “I think it happens when I really want to see someone. I think about them hard enough, and bam! I’m there,” she tells Liz, then shrugs. “I guess there are worse ways to get around.”

/

Max doesn’t come to the funeral, but Rosa sees him loitering next to his jeep just outside the gates of the cemetery. She growls at him under her breath every time she sees him so much as twitch, which seems to occur every time Liz’s shoulders heave with her sobs.

“Stay the fuck away from my sister, you asshole,” she says, keeping her eyes narrowed on him for the entirety of her graveside service.

She doesn’t have to worry about him staying away from Liz for much longer; the next week, Liz packs everything she can into a car and leaves Roswell, hopefully for good.

**July 2008**

The good thing about being dead, Rosa muses, is that she can go wherever she wants whenever she wants. She spends time in the passenger seat of Liz’s car as she drives through Texas down to Louisiana, and she’s with her sister when they both see the Gulf of Mexico for the first time. She sits with her dad every morning as he prays for her and for Liz. She goes to the Pony to hang out with Mimi and Maria every afternoon and comes to the startling realization that for the first time in a long time, she has no urge to drink.

She’s with Alex when he enlists in the Air Force, his face devoid of emotion as well as his rocking eyeliner and piercings, his father’s heavy hand on his shoulder the entire time.

(The bad thing about being dead, Rosa muses, is that she has to watch everything happening around her, and no matter what she does, she can’t affect change.)

She pops in on Jim every once in a while, too, and that’s how she comes to the realization that she has another sibling.

Not that she hadn’t known about Kyle before, of course, because he was a childhood friend, then the jackass who bullied Alex and-- ew, ew, ew-- dated Liz for most of high school. But it’s only after she’s dead and had time to really _think_ about it that she realizes that if Jim is her father, that makes Kyle her _brother_.

She spends almost an entire day with him, sitting on his bed and watching him flit around his room as he packs for college.

She’s there for dinner the night before Kyle leaves when there’s a knock on the front door, and Jim leaves the table to answer it, brow furrowed in confusion. Rosa follows, hoping for something interesting, as this dinner is hella boring.

“Valenti,” Jesse Manes nods to him as he opens the door.

Jim’s confusion turns to irritation. “What are you doing here, Manes?”

Manes lifts a folder between them and says, “We need to talk.”

Rosa looks him up and down. Manes is in his civilian clothes, but his stance and tone scream ‘military’. Though that’s not exactly abnormal for him, it does seem like he has something urgent to discuss, which piques Rosa’s curiosity.

Jim huffs and shakes his head. “Can it wait? It’s Kyle’s last night here, and--”

Manes shakes his head and interrupts, saying, “It’s about Rosa Ortecho’s death.”

And that grabs both of their attention. Jim narrows his eyes on Manes, who merely maintains icy-blue eye contact, face impassive. Finally, Jim nods and says, “Give me fifteen minutes. I’ll meet you at the bunker.”

“Bunker?” Rosa asks, eyebrows rising. “The cabin bunker?”  


They do not, in fact, meet at the cabin bunker, but at a sparsely populated military bunker outside of town.

“This is getting more and more interesting by the minute,” Rosa muses, following Jim down the stairs into a mostly cement room sparsely filled with metal furniture. “Home-y,” Rosa says drily.

She follows Jim to the table and sits on top of it as he and Jesse spread photographs and reports of Rosa’s autopsy out around her, including a photograph of her face with a handprint across her mouth.

That’s how she finds out about aliens.

**Year One**

Project Shepherd, on the whole, sounds like an alright idea to Rosa. Obviously aliens do pose a threat to humanity because, well, a human has died because of aliens.

Rosa spends a lot of time following Jim and/or Jesse Manes around as they investigate what happened the night she was murdered, and she grows increasingly frustrated when everything leads to dead ends.

Obviously there’s no connection through Jasmine or Kate, and they pursue that line for a while. Same with Frederico. Isobel Evans isn’t even questioned, because the bitch had refused to acknowledge her as her friend in public; no one even knew they had been hanging out.

“All the better to cover her murderous tracks with,” Rosa says with a sneer as she looks over all the notes compiled by Jim and Manes, spread out on the table down in the Project Shepherd bunker.

The best lead they have is Grant Green, who had been on peyote while filming out in the desert that night, but the stupid bastard hadn’t gotten any of the aliens on tape, just Rosa, Jasmine, and Kate’s floating bodies.

“Useless asshole!” Rosa yells at him in disgust, slamming her hands on his coffee table, wishing with all her might she could sweep all of their coffee mugs across it and onto the floor.

They take Green’s copy of the tape and pay him off to flood the airwaves with his particular brand of crazy bullshit, and that’s the last of the leads they have into what happened the night Rosa and the other two were killed.

“It was a long shot anyway.” Rosa shrugs, looking up at Jim, whose jaw and hands are clenched as he tries to prevent the tears in his eyes from falling.

She catches sight of Manes out of the corner of her eye. His eyes are narrowed on Jim, watching him closely. “Yeah,” Rosa murmurs to Jim. “Don’t let that asshole see you cry. He’ll see it as a weakness, and who knows what he’d do with it.”

/

She pops in on Liz and Kyle daily once they start school, mostly just to check in on them, but also to make sure they’re both having those normal college experiences everyone’s supposed to have.

Liz does not rush a sorority at UCLA, nor does she party every weekend like she’s supposed to. She goes to her classes and she studies and she’s the same Liz she’s always been, except maybe a little more sad.

Kyle, cliche that he is, does rush a frat, but it’s one of the good ones, the kind that actually encourage good study habits and community service and all that decent-person crap. Boring, compared to what she’s used to seeing in movies and on TV, but probably actually very good for Kyle the asshole. He starts to learn to be a little bit better than he was in high school, and Rosa beams with pride.

/

There’s a lot of backlash on her father because the narrative of the night of their deaths says Rosa was driving under the influence and killed herself, Kate, and Jasmine (another reason to hate Isobel, Max, and Michael, really). He deals with a lot of vandalism at the Crashdown and a sharp decrease in business that first month, but things mostly return to normal in the months following her death. 

He puts up a memorial of her in the kitchen and takes to talking to it a little every morning as he gets ready to open. Rosa answers every one of his questions and responds to every comment he makes to her, but of course, he doesn’t hear.

/

The first Christmas after Rosa’s death, Liz decides not to come home, for which Rosa is grateful. She’s seen Max Evans moping around town and she doesn’t want Liz to come home and get sucked back into the orbit of the boy who covered up her sister’s murder.

Instead, she and Arturo meet in the middle of California and New Mexico and spend a white Christmas in Flagstaff, Arizona. Rosa sits at the motel table with them as they eat churro pancakes cooked on a miniscule hotpad. She doesn’t think she’s seen either of them so happy in six months.

/

She does keep checking in on Jim because he is her other dad, and she does kind of love him, but she also wants to see if he and Manes have gotten anywhere with the investigation into her murder. It’s during one of these spontaneous check-ins that Rosa realizes Project Shepherd is not what she thought it was, at least not the way Manes runs it.

The facility is called Caulfield, and inside there are dozens of imprisoned aliens. They are isolated from each other behind thick glass panes, and most of them look older than her _abuela_ ever did, and she died when Rosa was little. Manes rarely releases them from the tiny boxes he calls cells, and when he does it’s to have a dead-eyed doctor or nurse take blood from them before…

Rosa can’t throw up, but she definitely feels like she will the first time she sees what Manes does to the aliens--the _people_ \--he’s keeping imprisoned in the name of the United States Government at Caulfield Prison.

It’s the first time she thinks Project Shepherd may not be such a great idea after all.

**Year Two**

In the week leading up to the first anniversary of Rosa’s murder, there are two bricks thrown through the windows of the Crashdown (one just before business hours, one in the middle of the night), and four separate instances of spraypaint vandalism on the outside walls of the cafe (three racist epithets and one death threat).

Insurance covers the windows, and a few late nights and elbow grease by Arturo take care of the petty vandalism. He fails to tell Liz about all of these incidents when she calls the morning of the anniversary and they spend an hour exchanging a little small talk and a lot of silence before Arturo opens the Cafe and Liz uses her fake ID to buy a bottle of Jose.

While Liz spends the day getting drunk in her apartment in California, Jim works a double at the station, as he has for the last week leading up to the anniversary. Kyle is back for the summer and has been loudly complaining that his father is not making any time for him, but Jim continues to bury himself in work. When not at the station, Jim’s at the Project Shepherd bunker, reviewing every page in the file about Rosa’s murder until he falls asleep right there at the table.

Jesse Manes wakes him up with cold eyes and the smallest smirk on more than one occasion in the weeks leading up to and following the anniversary of Rosa’s death, and Rosa can’t help but growl and bare her teeth at him when he does. “Fuck off, psycho,” she says, leaning up into his face for lack of any other options to get back at him.

/

She still visits the DeLucas regularly, though not often enough to realize something’s wrong with Mimi until well into the second year after her death. It’s an ordinary if slightly quiet Tuesday night and Rosa’s sitting at the bar next to Maria while she works on an assignment for one of her business classes. “Wait, you skipped a step here,” Rosa says, pointing it out on Maria’s paper.

Mimi snorts and pauses in the middle of wiping down the bar. “Now that’s what _I_ call a close encounter.”

Maria shakes her head and looks up, laughing. “What?”

Mimi resumes wiping the bar and smiles, looking up at her. “What, what?”

“Isn’t that from a movie? What on earth made you think to say it just now?” Maria asks, still sporting a bemused smile.

Mimi’s brows furrow and she shakes her head. “No, I didn’t say anything, baby. I haven’t said anything for a while because I didn’t want to interrupt your school work.”

Rosa tilts her head and looks over at Mimi, frowning. “No, we both heard you say it.”

Maria puts down her pen and laces her hands in front of her chest, leaning closer to her mom on the other side of the bar. “Mom. You just spouted a random line-- I’m pretty sure it was from _Independence Day_ \-- for no reason and then went back to wiping off the counter. I’m positive I heard you.”

Mimi shakes her head again and frowns. “What?”

Maria’s smile flattens out slowly and her forehead scrunches up in concern. “Are you okay?”

Mimi takes a deep breath, eyes flickering down to the pendant around Maria’s neck, then smiles and says, “I’m fine, baby. Must be the fumes.” She gestures down to the row of liquors on the shelf behind her and wrinkles her nose. “All these years of standing behind a bar are finally getting to me.”

Maria rolls her eyes and picks up her pen again. “Maybe you should take a vacation then,” she says, lips quirking as she turns back to her work.

Maria doesn’t see the fake smile Mimi sends her way, but Rosa does. “Maybe I will,” Mimi says quietly, eyes flicking down to Maria’s pendant again. “But maybe not.”

/

Towards the end of November, a year and a half after she was murdered by an alien, there’s a break in the case: an undocumented woman is found dead in a ditch outside of town with a handprint on her chest just like the one that had been on Rosa’s mouth.

If Rosa had a beating heart, she’s sure it would leap with hope in her chest, because it’s another chance for Jim and Manes to catch that bitch Isobel Evans and bring her to justice. Unfortunately, because the victim was undocumented, they have no way to find who she is or who she was travelling with, and thus no way to find out her connection to Isobel.

They run out of clues much more quickly than with Rosa’s case, and she goes into a rage.

She shows up at Isobel’s house for the first time, appearing right in the middle of her bedroom, and sees her humming happily to herself as she carefully applies mascara to her eyelashes. “Really? You kill another innocent woman, and now you’re just sitting here playing dress-up like Serial Killer Barbie? What the hell is wrong with you?”

She continues to yell obscenities at the blonde bitch for the next half hour, as she apparently gets ready for a date. She’s added obscene gestures and futile fists to Isobel’s perfectly made-up cheeks when the doorbell rings and Isobel runs to answer it.

The man on the other side of the door is a real looker. Tall, brown skin, dark hair, dressed like a prep school nerd... Really hot, if you’re into the sort of thing.

And apparently Isobel is, because her voice cracks slightly when she greets him. “Noah. You’re right on time,” she says, eyelashes fluttering.

“Isobel,” he says, holding out a dozen pink roses for her. “You look beautiful.”

Rosa rolls her eyes. “Seriously? You kill a woman and then two days later you’re going on a date with a charming, hot piece of ass like this? How is that fair?” 

Furious with the universe’s version of karma, Rosa follows them onto their date, trash talking Isobel the entire time and telling Noah all the reasons he should dump her ass. They flirt their way through dinner and get to know each other, all while Rosa sits by and gags loudly over Isobel’s plate.

They’re waiting for dessert when Isobel takes a sip of her water and narrows her eyes at him a little, a smirk gracing her lips. “So what’s your deal, Noah? Attractive, charming law student, and you take your winter vacation in Roswell, New Mexico? Not that I’m not glad,” she admits, holding her hands up. “Because it gave us a chance to meet, but it does seem a little too good to be true.”

The candlelight flickers over Noah’s face and he smiles, tilting his head a little as he says, “You think I’m too good to be true?” He laughs and shakes his head. “Well, Isobel, I can be anything you want me to be.”

Rosa sucks in a breath, eyes wide, and jumps up from the table, holding her hands out in front of herself as if to ward him off. “What the _fuck_ ,” she gasps out, shaking her head.

Isobel and Noah continue flirting, but Rosa stays a few feet back, behind Isobel, eyes unblinking as she watches Noah. That phrase… Rosa shakes her head, then tilts it to the side while she watches Noah charm his way into Isobel’s heart. She’ll never forget; she’d heard Isobel say it, just like that, about two minutes before she’d killed her.

**June 2010**

Liz is living in Texas on the second anniversary of Rosa’s death, and after she calls home to talk to their dad, she spends the entire day in bed. 

“A marked improvement over last year, when you got so drunk you couldn’t leave the apartment for two days,” Rosa tells her before she leaves to check in on their father.

/

Arturo takes the morning off, having spent the night before cleaning up more vandalism on the Crashdown’s front door. Before he goes downstairs to help out with the lunch rush, he spends a long time sitting at the end of his bed, tears dripping down his nose to land on his clasped hands. Rosa just sits with him until he lets out a long breath, shakes his head, and heads downstairs.

“I love you, _Papi_ ,” she whispers after him.

/

Jim’s drunk. 

It’s not the first time in recent memory; he’d fallen off the wagon when a third handprint victim was found a few months back and again, the trail led to no answers in the matter of Rosa’s death. Kyle’s the one who finds him nearly passed out on his back porch and brings him inside, takes care of him until he’s assured he won’t die choking on his own vomit.

“What happened, Dad? I thought you were getting better,” Kyle murmurs, brow furrowed in concern.

“He was, and then his kid was murdered,” Rosa tells him with a heavy sigh.

/

Alex is sitting at a computer terminal in a brightly lit room in who the hell knows where. His fingers fly across the keyboard and his eyes are narrowed in concentration, focused on one of many monitors. Rosa would almost assume he didn’t remember what the day was, but every once in a while he sniffles just the tiniest bit, and she can see that his eyes are rimmed with red.

“I miss you too, honey,” she says, resting her hand over his shoulder.

/

Maria’s been taking on more responsibility at the bar, so she institutes an Annual 90’s Night that just so happens to fall on the date of Rosa’s death. Before they open for the night, Rosa stands at the bar next to Mimi, smiling when Maria pulls out three shot glasses, setting one in front of each of them, and fills them with top shelf tequila.

“To Rosa!” Maria says, clinking her shot glass with Mimi’s, then with the one sitting directly in front of Rosa.

Mimi smiles down at the extra shot and nods. “To Rosa,” she says quietly.

Rosa smiles, swipes her hand through the glass, and wrinkles her nose. “It’s the thought that counts, I guess?”

/

Michael Guerin is getting steadily wasted on cheap whiskey and acetone in his Airstream. There are papers scattered all around, most of them covered in drawings and calculations, but a few seem to be crumpled up letters starting out “Dear Alex”.

Rosa takes a deep breath as she looks it all over, then sits down next to Michael on the bed. She places her hand over his knee and says, “I forgive you.”

/

She finds Max Evans at the Roswell Police Department, eyes aimed at some report sitting on the desk in front of him, but he goes a long time without turning the page, and his knee is jumping wildly under the desk.

Rosa watches him for a long time, the way his hand clenches and unclenches in his lap, and the slight flickering of his desk lamp. Finally, she nods and says, “I forgive you too, Evans.”

/

Isobel Evans has been unreasonably perky all day, flitting from a hair appointment to dress shopping with her mom as they make plans for a “very important date with Noah”. Rosa accompanies them for a while, keeping an especially close eye on Isobel when Noah conveniently happens to run into them and treats them both to an early dinner.

An obvious ploy to charm Mrs. Evans, Rosa thinks, lip curling in disgust as she watches him play both women like a fiddle.

Before he leaves them, he kisses Isobel chastely on the cheek and murmurs, “I love you,” into her ear.

Rosa moves to follow him, but before she gets too far away, she turns back to Isobel, who is blushing prettily with her hand on her cheek in the middle of the sidewalk. Rosa walks back to place her hand over the one Isobel is still holding on her cheek and says quietly, “I’m so sorry, Isobel. I’m so sorry he’s done this to you. To the both of us.”

/

Rosa rides shotgun in Noah’s SUV as he follows the sunset out of town to the middle of the desert. She watches as his charming facade cracks the farther from town they get and follows silently when he parks at the top of a hill and carefully makes his way down to his cave.

She follows him inside and paces the small cave as he lights all the candles, but keeps her back to the glowing, blanket-covered pod in the back corner. When he lays out the blanket on the floor and kneels in front of her charred corpse, she stands above him, back still to the glowing pod.

He starts with a long prayer in a language she doesn’t recognize, eyes closed and head bowed, but she keeps her eyes open and unblinking on him. Then he takes a deep breath and switches to English. “I’m so sorry, Rosa. I love you and hope you can forgive me for what I did to you.” He opens his eyes and looks up at her. “I’m doing everything I can to make it up to you, keeping your memory alive through my romance with Isobel. It’s nearly perfect.”

Rosa swallows hard around the lump in her throat and blinks back her tears. Hands clenched into fists at her sides, she kneels down slowly in front of him. “I will never forgive you,” she says, clearly and slowly. “You murdered me, and at least four other people.” Her fists unclench and clench again and she exhales shakily. “You’ve done something to Isobel to make her love you, just like you did something to her so you could try to be with me.” A shaky inhale and she leans a little closer to him, voice lowering as she pours all the menace she can into it. “You’re a monster, and I don’t know when or how, but someday you _will_ be caught, and I sincerely hope I’m there to see it.”


	7. I Saw the Sign

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A week after Noah tries to kill Liz, Cameron calls her back in to the station to review her statement from that night. Liz has been up half the night, mixing and looking at things under a microscope, so her patience is very thin. When Cam calls Max a knight in shining armor, Rosa sees the look of rage in Liz’s eyes and has to fight back her laugh.
> 
> She follows them both out of the interview room and says to Cameron, “You know, I don’t know if she’s more irritated at you for calling him that because that’s what he was and now she thinks he’s protecting my murderer, or for your obvious interest in him.”
> 
> As she walks her out, Cameron holds her card out to Liz and says, “If you think of anything else...”
> 
> Liz shakes her head and declines the card. “I’ve told you everything.” She turns to leave and pauses when she sees Max. They look at each other and Rosa sees Liz’s jaw clench.
> 
> Rosa sighs and follows after her, calling back to Cam, “Probably it was mostly the first one!”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to insidiousintent for your help with the chapter!
> 
> I used transcripts.foreverdreaming.org for help with episode dialogue again.

In the week following Max’s revelation about what he thinks happened the night Rosa died, there is a lot of avoiding going on between a lot of parties, which makes it rather difficult for Rosa to check in on everyone every day. She hasn’t had to do this much skipping around since before Liz and Alex both came home and all of the people she cares to stalk were able to get together more often.

Her father, on Liz’s insistence, has taken to starting work later in the morning and letting other people open the Crashdown for breakfast. He’s also spending more time in his office and less time on his feet, which is a relief to both Liz and Rosa. She’s also noticed he’s been looking up ways to modify some of their favorite dishes to comply with his new diet.

Of all the people she follows around, Arturo is the most stable, emotionally speaking. Everyone else is a fucking mess.

Max is avoiding his siblings, still angry about them sending Liz away after Rosa was killed. He doesn’t pick up when Isobel calls, which is an extreme reaction from him, nor does he respond to Michael’s perfunctory texts that they need to talk. He’s also avoiding Liz and vice versa.

Liz… is grieving for Rosa all over again. She’s been angrily clearing out Rosa’s side of their room, tearing down drawings and throwing her things into boxes. It hurts to watch, but Rosa knows her sister needs to process her death all over again now that she knows what she thinks is the truth. What’s more concerning than the late-night rage cleaning are the late-night lab experiments with the tubes of blood labeled with Max’s name. Nothing good can come of that, but Rosa’s helpless to convince Liz otherwise.

Isobel has been staying at the Airstream, sleeping late most mornings and half-heartedly completing her work from the trailer. She also went two days in a row without showering once, which is definitely a cry for help, in Rosa’s opinion.

Michael, when not spending an inordinate amount of time out in the junkyard tinkering with things, is doing his best to take care of Isobel. He runs her errands for her, and goes out to collect food for the both of them and, while Isobel is asleep inside, spends a lot of time looking up at the night sky, rehearsing things he wants to say to Noah to help Isobel out.

Rosa has to snort at that last one and she pats the air above Michael’s shoulder as she looks up at the stars next to him. “It’d be a nice thought, Mikey, if he weren’t gaslighting the shit out of her.”

Alex comes to the bar a few times to spend time with Maria and Mimi, and he tries to talk to Maria about Mimi’s deteriorating condition. Mostly she avoids that conversation, mistress of misdirection as she is, by claiming to be busy or through free drinks and winding conversations.

On top of that, Alex has taken to following his dad around town, covertly watching him from across streets and around corners, digging through trash cans to find out his secrets. There’s definitely something going on there, but Rosa hasn’t been able to figure out what set Alex on this mission all of a sudden, nor what his end game is.

Kyle is the only one of them who can put on a convincing outward appearance of a well-adjusted adult, but even he is cracking around the edges. He’s taking more doubles than he should, and when he’s done with his long shifts, he goes home to pour through old yearbooks and photo albums, searching for pictures of Rosa.

It’s exhausting popping from one person in crisis to the next, and on top of that, Rosa also has to keep an eye on her enemies.

Noah, that prick, has taken to working long hours at the law firm, likely researching to find his next victim, while also grumbling about lack of contact from Isobel. Apparently, he’d kicked her out of their house because she wasn’t being honest with him, and now he’s furious with her for not confessing her secret. Hypocrite much?

As for Jesse Manes, when not at work, he’s spending hours at a time in the Project Shepherd bunker, pouring over all of Noah’s murder files and rewatching alien autopsy and experiment videos recorded since the beginning of the project. Disturbing and horrifying are very mild descriptors for what she’s seen the doctors and personnel assigned to the project do, so Rosa doesn’t spend much time with him once she figures out what he’s doing.

/

A week after Noah tries to kill Liz, Cameron calls her back in to the station to review her statement from that night. Liz has been up half the night, mixing and looking at things under a microscope, so her patience is very thin. When Cam calls Max a knight in shining armor, Rosa sees the look of rage in Liz’s eyes and has to fight back her laugh.

She follows them both out of the interview room and says to Cameron, “You know, I don’t know if she’s more irritated at you for calling him that because that’s what he was and now she thinks he’s protecting my murderer, or for your obvious interest in him.”

As she walks her out, Cameron holds her card out to Liz and says, “If you think of anything else...”

Liz shakes her head and declines the card. “I’ve told you everything.” She turns to leave and pauses when she sees Max. They look at each other and Rosa sees Liz’s jaw clench.

Rosa sighs and follows after her, calling back to Cam, “Probably it was mostly the first one!”

/

Liz is already pissed as they walk out of the Sheriff’s station and out onto the street, but when she sees Isobel, she growls under her breath.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up. “Damn, Liz.” Isobel walks forward with a bouquet of roses, and Rosa has to shake her head. “Is,” she sighs, covering her eyes with her hands. “Did you really think _roses_ were going to do it?”

“I just need a minute,” Isobel pleads with Liz. “I’m sorry,” she whispers.

Liz is already holding her hand up and shaking her head. “I am not doing this, Isobel.”

“Listen, I am sorry,” she says, sincerity radiating from her. “I didn’t know. I still… I don’t remember why I would have-” She shrugs, struggling to say the words. “Done something like that.”

Rosa looks up at her and shakes her head. “You _wouldn’t_ have! _You_ didn’t!” She groans and rubs her eyes, sighing heavily before she says, “I wish I could tell you. I wish you could hear me. I wish _anyone_ could hear me properly!”

Liz tells Isobel she should be locked up, and Isobel asks why she hasn’t gone to the cops now that she knows the truth.   
  
“Because she can’t,” Rosa says.

Liz says the same thing, adding, “There is no justice. My sister dies a statistic and we’re just another immigrant family that America will be better off without.” Her voice cracks and Rosa steps closer to run her hand over Liz’s arm.

Isobel shakes her head. “We never meant to make her into a villain.”

Rosa sighs and looks over at her. “Yeah, but you did, and she’s had to live with that for ten years, Is. So has my dad. Can’t you understand why…” She shakes her head and shrugs. “Why that choice compounded her trauma?”

“You know what keeps me up at night?” Liz asks. “If you don’t know why you killed her, how can you guarantee it won’t happen again?”

Isobel looks down, and Rosa can see the same fear in her eyes. “Oh, hon,” she says, reaching over to ghost her hand over Isobel’s cheek. She’s never wanted to kill Noah more.

“I know you had another blackout last week,” Liz continues, and each word makes Isobel flinch a little. “It could escalate again. And this time, if you hurt someone, that blood is on _my_ hands. Because I’m keeping your secret, even now.”

Liz storms past her, shaking her head, and Isobel turns to watch her, eyes full. A broken sound catches in her throat and she drops the bouquet, bringing her hands up to cover her face. Rosa sighs and runs a hand down her back, whispering, “I’m so sorry, Isobel. It’s not your fault, and I’m so sorry you’re having to live with it.”

Isobel shudders, then stiffens, dropping her hands and throwing her shoulders back, eyes scanning the street for anyone who may have seen her breakdown. Rosa glances around too, and no one seems to be watching. Isobel lets out a relieved breath and shakes herself. She leans down to pick up the roses, gets back in her car, and, after a brief glance in the mirror to make sure she looks alright, merges into the early morning traffic on the street.

/

It’s Saturday, but Liz goes back to the hospital and pulls out whatever she’s been working on with Max’s blood.

Rosa groans and drops onto one of the stools at her work counter. “Liz. I never thought I’d say this, but I need you to start thinking with your brain instead of your emotions right now.” She takes a slow breath and her eyes follow Liz as she moves from one spot to another in her lab, making notes on her pad and muttering to herself. “Whatever you’re doing with Max’s blood, I know it’s not for their benefit, and I’m really worried you’re going to do something you’ll end up regretting, even if you never find out the truth about what happened to me that night.”

There’s a knock on the door and they both turn to watch as Alex opens the door and steps through. “Alex!” they say together.

“Mad scientist is a good look for you,” he tells Liz.

Rosa scrunches up her nose and shakes her head. “Not right now it’s not.”

Liz asks why he’s in the hospital and notices he’s without his crutch.

“Yeah,” he says, looking down at his leg and smiling a little. “I just… I needed a little time to get used to the new normal.” He shrugs and says, “Not planning on running any marathons anytime soon, though.”

Rosa fake-gags and shakes her head, smiling. “Running is the worst, though. Now you have a legitimate excuse not to!”

Liz picks up her notes and shrugs as she turns back to her computer. “Oh, I don’t know, an excuse to avoid running sounds like a perk to me,” she jokes, and Rosa has to laugh at how she and Liz sometimes seem to share a brain.

Alex steps further into the lab and tells Liz he’s there to see her. “I’ve called, but, umm…” He shrugs and looks at her for an explanation.

She doesn’t even look up from her experiment. “Oh, I-I haven’t really looked at my phone,” she tells him.

Alex is quick to come back with, “You know nobody believes that excuse, right?” Rosa laughs and slides off her stool to plant a smacking kiss just over his cheek. Liz lets out a huff of laughter and Alex continues, tone less playful, “Maria’s also left a message. Did you get that, or…?”

Liz nods and finally looks up at him again, “Yeah, I’ve just been really focused on my work.”

“Liar,” Rosa scowls, standing even with Alex as she crosses her arms over her chest.

Alex’s Eyebrows of Sass goes up and he says, “Yeah, clearly. You’re the only one here on a Saturday.”

Liz turns away from her work and gives him an exasperated look. Rosa shrugs and says, “What? You know he’s right!”

Alex licks his lips and continues, “Look, Maria’s too nice to say anything, but I left nice back in the Middle East.” Rosa snorts and shakes her head in disagreement. Alex tilts his head and the Eyebrows go up again as he says to Liz, “You’ve been a crappy friend.”

Rosa sucks in a breath and scrunches her nose. “I mean, did you have to put it like that?” she says, then reevaluates who she’s talking to. “Yeah, you kind of did.”

Liz tilts her head and says, “Excuse me?”

Alex’s confrontational tone mellows a bit and he says, “Since you’ve been home, have you two talked at all about what’s going on with her?”

Liz shakes her head. “I’ve been preoccupied,” she offers as an excuse, but her tone says she knows it’s not a good one.

“Look I get it,” Alex says, stepping closer. “It is easy to get caught up in your problems, your trauma, your work.” He huffs out a small laugh and smiles kindly at her. “But sometimes, Liz, you gotta be a human being, too.”

She smiles wryly at him and whispers, “Yeah.”

Alex shrugs and says, “You got time now? I was just heading over to the Pony.” His eyes slide over all of the beakers and notes and computer screens then back to Liz.

Her eyes make the same trip around the lab as she bites her lip. Finally, she looks down at the pad in her hand. “This can wait a day,” she tells him with a shrug.

Rosa does a little victory dance between them. “Thank god. Anything to stop whatever mistake she’s making in here right now.”

He smiles and nods. “Good. I’ll meet you there in a few?” he asks as he turns back to the door.

Liz nods, but before he can leave she calls out to him. “Alex?”

He turns back at the door and lifts an eyebrow in question.

She smiles and says, “Thanks for coming in to call me out.”

His lips twitch and he rolls his eyes. “Anytime.”

She nods and he leaves. Liz takes a minute to put some things away and make sure nothing will explode while she’s gone. As she hangs up her lab coat and heads downstairs, Rosa follows after her and looks up at the sky. “Thank you for Alex Manes,” she says sincerely.

/

Before they step inside the bar, Alex pulls Liz to a stop and she and Rosa look back at him with furrowed brows. He licks his lips and shakes his head a little before he says, “Look, it’s going to be a little…” he shrugs and sighs. “Upsetting, and maybe a little scary, to see Mimi this way, especially since you haven’t seen her in ten years.”

Liz’s eyebrows go up. “Alex, what’s going on? What are you talking about?”

He shrugs again and says, “Mimi’s not well, and I just want you to be prepared for that.”

Rosa sighs and leans back against the door to the Pony. “I mean, I don’t think there’s going to be any preparing she can do for this, but okay. I guess it’s good to just give her a heads up.”

Liz looks up into Alex’s eyes, eyebrows scrunched in concern, and finally nods once before they turn to head inside.

Rosa follows and sees Maria and Mimi sitting at a table near the door. “Can I get a jacket?” Mimi’s asking.

Liz steps forward and pulls hers off as she smiles and says, “Here, take mine.”

Alex follows and says, “Hi, Mimi.”

“Hey, Mimi!” Rosa says, following behind Liz.

“Oh, hi!” Mimi says, all smiles.

Liz hands over her jacket to Mimi and gives her a hug. “Mama DeLuca! I missed you!”

Mimi hugs her back and says, “Where the hell have you been, kid?”

Liz sits down next to her, across from Maria, and says, “Oh, everywhere but here, but I’m back now.” She tilts her head and apologizes for not visiting sooner.

Rosa scrunches her nose and stands behind her sister’s chair. “Yeah, and I’m sorry for not nagging her incessantly to come, despite the fact that it wouldn’t have helped.”

Mimi pulls on the jacket and waves off her apology. “Stuff happens. You don’t need to apologize.”

Liz sends an apologetic look over to Maria, who nods back her understanding and forgiveness.

Mimi leans forward and pats Liz’s hand, eyes flitting to Liz’s, up above her head for less than half a second, then back down to Liz again. “What’s important is you’re here now, Rosa.”

Rosa sucks in a breath, eyes widening. Mimi has always, somehow, sensed Rosa’s presence and shown it in a million little ways, but she’s never _looked_ at her the way she did just now. Rosa has noticed that Mimi’s ability to sense her presence, and even sometimes her feelings, has gotten better over the years, even as her mind has apparently weakened. “Is it because Liz is here and we’re together, or are you just getting worse?” Rosa murmurs, stepping around Liz to kneel at Mimi’s feet, looking up at her. “Mimi?” she asks, placing her hands over Mimi’s legs.

But Mimi’s focus only shifts to Maria, who is trying to remind her mom who Liz is, then back to Liz herself. “I haven’t seen you since high school,” Mimi says to Liz, then looks her over again. “Girl, you got hot.”

Liz makes a happy sound deep in her throat and leans through Rosa to give Mimi another hug. Rosa moves out of their way, sighing when Mimi’s focus stays squarely on Liz. “God, I hope it’s not my fault,” she whispers, not for the first time, bringing her hands up to cover her mouth as she inhales deeply through her nose.

Liz follows Maria up to the bar when she stands up to get more drinks for the table, and Rosa goes with.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” Liz asks Maria, tone baffled.

Maria shrugs and gets them both drinks, visibly stopping herself from reaching for a third glass. Rosa shudders and sits on the stool on Liz’s other side. “I hope I’m not making you crazy too,” she says, as Maria reassures Liz it’s not her fault.

“What’s the diagnosis?” Liz asks.

Rosa rolls her eyes and snorts when Maria tells Liz everything it’s not. “More possibilities include,” Rosa adds, holding up a finger. “The ghost hanging around, though I really hope that’s not it, because I just love being with her and would hate to have to stop dropping by, or…” She holds up a second finger and wiggles it. “Aliens.” She leans forward and nods, scrunching up her nose as she whispers, “My money’s on aliens.” She eyes the rest of Liz’s drink wistfully and says, “God knows some of them are capable of it.”

“Have you thought about putting her in a care facility?” Liz asks Maria.

“No, that just feels like giving up hope,” Maria says quickly, but Rosa’s seen her looking at a few websites over the last several weeks when she’s been working alone in her office. Maria shakes her head and looks away, saying, “I’m not down for that yet.”

Rosa gets up and stands next to Maria, forehead hovering just over Maria’s shoulder. “I know, but it’s been a lot for you. It’s okay to need help sometimes, you know.”

Liz leans forward and places her hand on Maria’s knee, telling her the same thing. Then her eyes light up with an idea. “Let’s give her a full-on Mama DeLuca day,” Liz suggests, talking about going to the Crashdown and the drive-in, just Alex, Maria, Liz, and Mimi, like old times.

Rosa steps back and claps her hands. “Yes! Please! Let’s do shakes and a movie, and just hang out for a day! No aliens, and no alien shenanigans!”

Maria agrees, smiling and they head back to Mimi and Alex to break the news. Rosa trails behind, biting her lip. “And maybe today will have the added benefit of giving your anger time to cool,” she murmurs, looking at Liz and shrugging.

/

At the Crashdown, Liz dons her antenna and takes their lunch orders. Rosa takes a few minutes to check in on their father in his office, then heads back out when their food is ready.

Liz presents Mimi’s lunch with a flourish. “Saturn’s Rings, Blast from the Past-rami, Shatner’s Special Shake, hold the cherry,” she says as she sets the food down in front of Mimi.

Mimi smiles and says, “Rosa, you remembered!”

Liz freezes for a second before she continues scooting into the booth with Mimi, exchanging a look with Maria as she reminds her mom about Rosa.

Rosa just sighs heavily and says, “Not me, Mimi, Liz.”

Maria leaves, visibly upset, and Liz follows. Rosa slides into the booth next to Alex, across from Mimi, and sighs. “I wish I knew for sure if I was making you worse or not,” she murmurs, watching Alex scoot closer to her and pick a fry from his plate.

“These are so much better when you dip them in the shake,” he says to Mimi.

Rosa snorts. “Obviously,” she says, at the same time as Mimi. Rosa groans and leans down to rest her chin on top of her hands, which are flat on the table.

“You have a worried face,” Mimi says. “You didn’t used to have that face.”

Alex stirs his shake a few times and tilts his head. “We’re all concerned, Mimi.”

“No, it’s not that,” she tells him. “You have a secret.”

His lips quirk and he shakes his head as he says, “I’ve already come out to you, like, seven times, you know.”

Rosa laughs and shakes her head, tilting it to rest her cheek on her hand so she can look up at him. “Seven? Pretty sure it was at least ten,” she says, remembering all the ways he’d practiced coming out to his own mom on Mimi. “My personal favorite was the haiku.”

“You look like your dad today,” Mimi says slowly.

Rosa hears the hitch in Alex’s breathing and her head shoots up to look at Mimi, eyebrows coming together. “Whoa, there, Mimi. That wasn’t a nice thing to say!”

“Oh good,” Alex says drily, and Rosa can see the faint tremble of his left leg under the table. “I was hoping that the rage face might skip a generation.”

“Not your face,” Mimi says. “Your aura.”

Rosa rests her hand just over Alex’s shoulder and she turns back to Mimi. “What are you talking about?”

Mimi’s voice softens and she says, “I grew up with Jesse Manes, Alex. And I knew the very day that he learned too much, because he came to school with the darkest energy around him.” Her brows furrow. “Energy from another place.”

Rosa’s eyebrows shoot up. “You could tell when he got involved in Project Shepherd?” she asks, leaning closer to Mimi over the table. “How? What did you feel from him? Are you sure he didn’t always have a hateful, dark aura? Because I find it hard to believe--” Her mouth snaps shut when she thinks she sees Mimi’s eyes flicker over to her and back to Alex again just as quickly.

“Something broke in this town once,” Mimi continues. “Long ago. And the pieces shattered.” Rosa sees Alex stiffen next to her and she looks over at him in question as Mimi leans closer and says, voice urgent, “We aren’t meant to touch things from another world, Alex.”

Rosa’s watching him closely, so she sees the way Alex’s jaw clenches slightly. “What have you touched, Alex?” she whispers, and then her lips quirk as she rolls her eyes. “Besides Michael, I mean, but you don’t know he’s an alien. Yet,” she adds, wiggling her eyebrows at him.

Mimi continues, eyes steady on Alex as she takes his hand. “The other world creeps into us and makes us ugly inside. Don’t let it do to you what it did to your father. What it did to...poor, sweet, Jimmy Valenti.”

Rosa’s eyes widen and she looks back to Mimi, asking for clarification at the same time Alex does. “Wait, what?”

Mimi looks away from Alex, her eyes sliding right over Rosa as she says, “Where did Rosa run off to?”

“I--I’m right here, Mimi,” Rosa says, standing up and coming around to her side of the booth. “C-can you…” She lifts her hand, waving it in Mimi’s face. “Can you still sense me here?” she asks, panic growing in her chest. It eases when Mimi’s eyes flicker in her direction again.

“Mimi,” Alex says, and Mimi’s attention snaps back to him. “You were about to say something about Jim Valenti.”

Mimi’s whole body relaxes, her tone changing as she says, “Ugh, Jim Valenti.” She pulls away from Alex and reaches for her napkin and cutlery. “You know he cheats on his wife, right? Someone should tell her.”

Alex sighs heavily, knowing he’s lost Mimi’s train of thought.

“It’s not the first time it’s happened, nor will it be the last,” Rosa says to him, slipping in beside Mimi and leaning her head back on the booth.

“But not me, and not right now,” Mimi says, smiling over at Alex. “Right now I want to talk about you. What’s going on with you, kid?”

Alex’s lips quirk and he shakes his head. “Mimi…” He picks up another fry and dips it in his shake. “There’s nothing going on with me.”

Mimi shakes her head and finishes chewing her bite of Saturn’s Rings. “No, no, none of that, Alexander Manes. I know _something’s_ going on with you.”

Rosa perks up and links her hands in front of herself, resting them on the table. “Ask him about Michael,” she whispers out of the side of her mouth. “They had a date a couple weeks ago and I don’t think it ended well, but I haven’t been able to figure out what happened.”

Alex shakes his head. “There’s nothing going on with me. I’ve just started on a special project, but I haven’t gotten anywhere on it yet.” He leans down to take a drink of his shake and murmurs, “Though I’ve got some ideas on other avenues to pursue now.”

Mimi hums and narrows her eyes on him. “No, that’s not it.” She leans in, staring intently, and Alex mirrors her, lips twitching up in an involuntary smile. Suddenly, Mimi leans back and grins. “There’s a boy.”

Rosa laughs at the way Alex’s grin drops and he scowls. “No, there isn’t. I--” He shrugs and growls a little. “There’s no boy,” he grumbles, picking up another fry and stabbing it into his shake.

“Liar, liar, pants on fire!” Rosa sings, leaning over the table to taunt him. Then her eyes narrow as she reconsiders. “Though, it’s true, I don’t know anyone who would call Guerin a mere ‘boy’. He is definitely a _man_ ,” she says breathily, fanning herself dramatically.

Mimi’s smile widens. “A man, then,” she corrects, picking up her sandwich. “Tell me about this man you’re in love with.”

Rosa’s eyebrows go up. “In love?” she asks, voice high. “You’ve never said you were in love with him!”

Alex drops his soggy fry onto his plate and shakes his head. “I’m not--” He shakes his head and huffs out a flat laugh, looking up at her. “I’m not seeing anyone,” he finally says.

Mimi’s eyebrows go up. “But you are in love with someone,” she says, and she searches his face. “Have been for a long time.”

Rosa squeaks and bounces up and down on the bench next to Mimi. “Oh my god, yes! They’ve both been pining for a decade now, it’s been _ridiculous_!”

Alex is straightening his basket of fries, his flatware, his napkin, not looking up at Mimi. “Yes,” he says softly.

Mimi nods, small smile still gracing her face as she says quietly, “And he’s in love with you.”

Alex snorts and rolls his eyes, finally looking back up at her. “You can’t possibly know that. You don’t even know who he is.”

Mimi lifts a brow and hums, taking another bite of her sandwich as she considers him. “No, but a love that lasts this long and still feels this strong isn’t a love to be taken lightly. There’s a strong connection there, am I right?”

Rosa presses her lips together and runs her hands down the sides of her face. “Jesus, Mimi, you’re such a sappy _romantic_.” But she loves that about her.

Alex lets out a slow breath and nods once, firm.

Mimi continues to study him as she eats. “Who is he?” she finally asks softly, tilting her head to the side.

He shakes his head and opens his mouth. “I--” He clears his throat and sits up straight. “I can’t tell you, Mimi. I can’t out him like that.”

Rosa snorts. “Please. Michael Guerin would walk down Main with his hand in your back pocket if you allowed him to,” she says. “Or worse.”

Mimi dips a fry and eats it, eyes narrowing on Alex. “If I guess his name, would you tell me?”

Alex smiles and lifts a brow. “If you guess his name, wouldn’t you just be able to read my aura and figure it out, or something?”

Mimi’s lip curves up and she narrows her eyes on him. “Maybe. Care to try it?”

He rolls his eyes and says, “Fine.”

Rosa laughs and claps, saying, “It’s not cheating if you get help from, like, The Great Beyond or whatever, right?”

Mimi merely hums and tilts her head, presumably thinking about the eligible young men in town.

“Great!” Rosa says, scooting closer to her and saying, as loudly and clearly as she can, “Michael Guerin. Michael. Guerin. Mi-chael. Gue-rin.”

Mimi’s lips twitch and she says, “I’m thinking of a name starting with...M. Am I on the right track?”

Alex’s eyebrows go up and his jaw drops, “What--How--”

At that moment, Liz walks up to the table, a big smile on her face and says, “You guys ready to head over to the drive-in?”

“Buzzkill,” Rosa says, scowling.

/

When they get to the drive-in, Liz and Maria insist on unloading the snacks and blankets from the cars so Mimi and Alex can sit back and relax. Rosa sits on the sliver of bench on Mimi’s right side and glances over at Liz and Maria at the truck before she whispers, “Ask him about the boy again!”

Mimi smiles and holds out her hands to Alex. “May I read you? I’m still trying to figure out who the boy is. Man,” she corrects with a sparkle in her eye.

Alex rolls his eyes and sighs, but reluctantly sets his hand in hers, palm up.

Mimi takes a deep breath and closes her eyes for a second, then opens them with a frown. “Not what I was expecting.”

Rosa quirks an eyebrow up. “What, no Guerin?”

“Why? What do you see?” Alex asks, shifting closer.

Liz and Maria walk back over with the blankets and food as Mimi says, “I see a beautiful girl on your arm this year.”

Rosa bursts into laughter and shakes her head, sitting up on her knees on the bench to lean over Alex’s hand. “Are you sure about that one, Mimi?” She looks over and narrows her eyes and smirks when she sees the glint in Mimi’s eyes. “What are you up to?”

Mimi finishes her reading, predicting that Alex is going to get a puppy this year. “That sounds infinitely more plausible,” Rosa says with a nod.

Alex nods and laughs, then lets out a slow, relieved breath. “Alright, do Maria,” he says.

Maria declines, stating she doesn’t want spoilers, so Mimi volunteers Liz. She declines at first too, but Mimi convinces her, so Liz sits next to Alex and reaches across the table to give Mimi her hand.

“This oughta be interesting,” Rosa murmurs, chin resting in her hands as she leans over Liz and Mimi’s hands.

“The last time I read your aura, you were at a crossroads,” Mimi says quietly, looking up at Liz. “What happened? What road did you take, Rosa?”

Rosa’s elbow slips and her chin drops as she swings her head back to look over at Mimi. She’s still looking directly at Liz, but one of her hands seems to be slowly drifting closer to Rosa.

Liz takes a shaky breath before spinning the story of Rosa’s life if she’d lived. Rosa leans back as she listens and sits down on the bench next to Mimi, sighing heavily. Her lips twist and she shakes her head. “I guess it’s true, I have been clean for ten years, but not by choice or through any effort on my part. And I might have gone to art school, but not in _Paris_ , _god_. Too bougie,” she says, her smile growing. “I would have settled for a state school.” 

“Mostly, I learned to love myself,” Liz is saying, eyes shining, and Rosa has to cover her face in response. “I visit home a lot, to see my dad. We make churro pancakes, and any time I feel like I am slipping into a dark place,” Liz’s voice cracks and Rosa has to stand up and walk over to her. “I confide in him, and in my sister, and they help me find the light.”

Rosa drops onto the bench next to Liz and leans forward to rest her forehead near Liz’s shoulder, shaking her head as she swallows against the lump in her throat. “Liz,” she says quietly.

“You have a beautiful destiny,” Mimi says quietly, and Rosa tilts her head so she can see her. “You always did, Rosa,” Mimi finishes, and Rosa has to bite back the sob that builds in her chest. 

Rosa clears her throat. “No, I don’t,” she says, shaking her head as a tear trails down her cheek. “I’m dead, and I can’t do anything but stand by and watch all the people I love suffer.” She closes her eyes and turns back into Liz’s shoulder. “It’s horrible.”

/

Being with Mimi, sitting near her and having the feeling of being seen and not seen at the same time, is getting to Rosa, so when Alex and Maria start a game of cornhole, Rosa follows them and leaves Liz to talk to Mimi alone.

The first round, she sits next to the platform, holding her hand out to watch the beanbags fall through them as Alex and Maria throw them into the holes, awarding them extra points for hitting her.

“Thank you, for getting Liz today, for doing all this,” Maria says a few minutes into their game, running a hand down Alex’s arm before she tosses her beanbag.

Alex shakes his head and smiles as he says, “You don’t have to thank me for being a friend, Maria.” He tosses his last beanbag and walks over to retrieve them.

Maria sighs and bends over to grab hers as well. “I know, but I also know you’ve been busy too, and I appreciate your spending time with--”

“Maria!” Alex cuts her off, shaking his head again. “I haven’t been too busy to spend time with the people I love, and Liz needed the reminder. It’s not a big deal.”

Rosa sighs and stands up, wiping the nonexistent sand from her jeans as she walks back with them. “Yeah, and her stuff is important, but so is yours, and you made the time,” she says to Alex. She turns to Maria and nods. “He was right to call her out.”

Maria turns to him, nose scrunching up as she inhales slowly. “You have been busy, though. How _are_ things with you?” she asks, turning to throw a beanbag.

Alex tilts his head, eyes narrowing a bit on her. “What things?”

Maria rolls her eyes and nudges him to throw a beanbag. “How are things with...Jesse?” she asks, hesitating over the name.

Alex’s eyebrows go all the way up and he laughs, tossing his beanbag. “You don’t have to hesitate over his name like it’s a swear,” he tells her.

“I don’t know, saying his name might actually summon him, like a _real_ demon,” Rosa mutters, pacing to the game platform and back.   


Maria’s nose scrunches again and she tilts her head. “I feel like I kind of do?” she says. “Doesn’t saying the devil’s name summon him or something?”

Alex throws his head back and laughs, while Rosa splutters and rolls her eyes, smiling.

Maria shrugs and says, “Well, I’d hate for him to show up and ruin our great day.”

Alex shakes his head and throws another beanbag. “You don’t have to worry about that. He’s been too busy working on something lately to bother with me.”

Rosa perks up and says, “Is that what you’ve been following him around for? Trying to figure out what he’s doing?”

Maria hums and tosses her last beanbag. “Do you know what?” she asks, then looks over at Alex as he throws his last beanbag and narrows her eyes. “Or is it, like, a super secret government thing?”

Alex shakes his head and smiles, walking over to lean up against her truck. “It’s ultra-secret, apparently, but I don’t think it’s government-related.” He sighs and looks over as Maria settles next to him. “I think I might have to call my mom about it.”

Rosa and Maria suck in a breath simultaneously. Rosa, eyes wide, reaches out and lets a hand hover over Alex’s arm, while Maria shifts close enough to bump into him and says, “You want me to sit with you when you call her?”

Alex bumps her back, smiling, and shakes his head. “No, I’ll be fine,” he says. Then he takes a deep breath and nods once. “I think this could be big. Big enough for me to finally get out from under him.”

Maria sighs and twists her arm with his. “Sweetie, I know he’s been your hell all these years, but are you sure this is the way you want to break free of him? Opening up old wounds and digging into what I’m sure are dangerous secrets?” Alex opens his mouth to argue but Maria shakes her head. “I just don’t want you to get hurt.”

Rosa moves to stand in front of both of them, creating a triangle, and hovers a hand over each of their arms. “He’s already been hurt. This is him trying to burn out the infection and finally rid himself of evil,” she says. “Play it close to the vest, though, Alex, because what he’s involved in is bigger than you can imagine.”

/

Liz leaves the movie early, needing to check in on her Max experiments, but once Rosa hears they’ll be heading to Sunset Mesa after, she decides to stay with Mimi instead of accompanying her sister.

She sits next to Mimi in the back of Maria’s truck, both of them looking up at the movie on the screen. “I’m sorry, Mimi,” she says quietly, scooting closer, so there’s only a sliver of space between her arm and Mimi’s. “God, I hope this wasn’t my fault,” she whispers.

Mimi lets out a long sigh and says, “I’ve missed this.” Her eyes flicker over to Alex and Maria, who stand just out of earshot, talking. “Lunches at the Crashdown, taking you kids to the movies, grilling you about your love lives, and messing with you all about the psychic thing.” She smiles and nods. “Today was a good day.”

Rosa blinks back tears and turns back to the movie. “Yeah, it was.”

/

They all crowd into the cab of Maria’s truck for the drive to Sunset Mesa Assisted Living, Maria driving, holding one of Mimi’s hands while Alex holds the other, and Rosa sits on the last sliver of seat by the passenger door.

When they arrive, Rosa sits with Alex as he fills out most of the paperwork, while Mimi and Maria get a tour of the facility and Maria helps Mimi settle in for the night. 

Maria comes back alone, tears streaming down her face, and Alex stands up to give her a hug.

“Thank you,” Maria says, burying her face in his shoulder. She squeezes him hard around the middle. Rosa stands at their sides and lifts her arms around both of them.

“It’s gonna be okay, Maria,” Alex whispers, pressing a kiss to her hair.

Maria pulls back and nods, smiling at him. “Of course. It’s just hard, you know?” she says, shrugging.

Alex nods. “Yeah.” He leans down to pick up the packet of paperwork and hands it to her. “I filled out almost everything, but there are a couple things you’ll need to fill out.”

Maria nods, flipping through the packet and adding things every few pages. She gets to the last page and looks back up at him. “Will you be the second emergency contact?”

Alex’s eyebrows go up in surprise, but he nods as he steps forward to pull her into his arms again. “Of course,” he whispers into her hair.

Rosa sighs and drops her forehead to Maria’s shoulder, her hand running down Maria’s back in tandem with Alex’s.

/

Alex is reluctant to leave Maria alone, but she pastes on a smile and insists he head home, since he has work in the morning.

“I’ll be with her,” Rosa tells him.

He’s still slow to leave, but he does go, and as soon as he’s gone Maria’s fake smile drops. She buries her face in her hands and stands alone in the middle of the bar, shoulders heaving as she sobs.

Rosa wraps her arms around Maria and stands on her tiptoes to rest her cheek above her head, making soothing noises. “I’ve got you, babe,” she says, ghosting her hands over Maria’s shoulders and back, brushing weightless kisses on her temple and in her hair.

Maria’s sobs slow so they make their way over to the bar, Rosa still hovering at Maria’s side. Maria pulls down two glasses unthinkingly, and a bottle of tequila, and sets them on the counter before coming back around the bar to sit on a stool. 

“I’m sorry, Maria. This blows,” Rosa says, sighing and taking the stool next to her.

Maria looks down at the two glasses with a frown, then shrugs and pours a generous helping of the tequila for herself. She sips it slowly, fighting back more tears. 

“Just let it go, babe,” Rosa whispers, brushing at Maria’s flyaway hairs. “It’s okay to keep crying. You’ve got no one to front for any longer.” She snorts and shrugs. “Except a dead woman, but even now I’m the last one who would be judging you.”

Maria shakes her head and takes another sip, breathing deep. Rosa turns when she hears the door open and someone walk in; Maria just finishes her drink and starts pouring herself a new one.

That someone turns out to be Michael and Rosa has to roll her eyes. “So much for an alien-free day,” she says, looking up at the clock. “Though I guess this was a pretty long stretch.”

Maria sees him in the mirror and calls out, “Sorry, we’re closed,” in a surprisingly even tone.

“I _really_ need you to be open,” Michael says, voice heavy with emotion.

“What the fuck happened to you in one day?” Rosa asks. Her eyes narrow at the lost look on his face when Maria tells him the bar is closed again.

Rosa looks back at Maria and makes a questioning sound in her throat. Maria swallows and says to Michael, “One drink, no talking.”

“Thank you,” Rosa whispers to her, standing up so Michael doesn’t end up sitting on her. “He looks like he needs one too.”

Maria slides the bottle of tequila over to him and he pours himself a drink in Rosa’s glass, letting out a heavy sigh before saying, “Thank you. I--”

Maria cuts him off with a shake of her head, saying, “Seriously, Guerin,” and making a noise of refusal.

Rosa sits on her other side and eyes both of them, sitting up straight and saying, “Uh oh,” when the dam breaks and tears start streaming down Maria’s face again. She looks over at Michael, who is watching Maria cry, looking a little panicked, but once Maria hunches in on herself and lets the sobs break free, he wraps his arm around her and starts making noises of comfort. Maria burrows into him more, continuing to cry on him as Michael offers his quiet, steady brand of comfort.

Rosa brushes her own tears away and nods at him. “Thanks, Michael.”

/

She goes to find Liz, who had popped by Sunset Mesa long enough to give Mimi and Maria hugs only to disappear again, presumably back to her lab and whatever she was working on with Max’s blood.

“Almost a whole day,” Rosa says on a sigh, sitting down and watching Liz move around the lab. “You went almost the whole day, but we still ended up back here.” She looks around and shrugs. “Will it be worth it, whatever this thing you’re creating does?”

Liz doesn’t answer, just keeps moving around, checking numbers on screens, and pulling up notes on her pad.

Max wanders in a while later, his tread heavy and his eyes sad. “What _happened_ today?” Rosa asks, standing to walk over to him.

“We locked her up,” Max tells them, and Rosa’s eyes widen. “Kyle pulled some strings, and…” He takes a breath to steady himself. “She’s not going anywhere for a while.”

Rosa’s hand hovers over his arm and she looks over her shoulder back at Liz.

Max continues, “So maybe hold off on testing your _poison_ on her. Please.”

Rosa’s jaw drops and she turns to face Liz. “ _Poison_?”

Liz’s shoulders drop and she looks away, ashamed. “I’m getting rid of the serum,” she says.

Rosa lets out a shaky breath and nods, relieved, but then she thinks about it and freezes in place.

“Why?” Max asks.

“I became a scientist to help people,” Liz explains. “To build something and to keep people from slipping away before their time.”

Rosa makes a wounded sound and steps closer to her sister, crossing her arms over her stomach.

“What you did to Rosa made me forget that,” Liz says softly. She picks up a syringe from one of the containers on her work station and holds it up. “This isn’t how I want my mind to work, all rage and vengeance.” She places the syringe in front of Max on the counter.

“It’s a hard way to exist,” Rosa nods. “And it’ll burn you up from the inside. I’m proud of you for realizing that Lizzie, but…” She shakes her head and sighs heavily, placing her fingers on her temples.

“You’re making a mistake,” Max says, stepping forward to lift the syringe.

“What?” Liz asks incredulously

Rosa nods, eyes flickering to Max. “I agree.”

“You should keep working on the serum,” he says, fingers drifting over the syringe. “Maybe you can figure out a way to end all this, make us normal.”

Rosa shakes her head and steps forward to place her hand over his. “No,” she says softly. “You don’t need to be _normal_ , and normal’s overrated anyway.” She sighs and looks over at Liz. “But you might need something to use against Noah.”

Max seems to be thinking along similar lines as her, because he tells Liz, “If something happens and I can’t protect you and Isobel at the same time, you should have a way to protect yourself.” He places the syringe in her hand and closes her fingers around it.

Rosa places her hand over both of theirs and looks at Liz. “Keep it, Liz, because Noah’s strong, and this could be the key to bringing him down.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Alex's haiku for coming out to his mom:
> 
> Don't want to date girls  
> No boobs or V; I like D  
> I am super gay.


	8. Barely Breathing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m trying to think of a time we may have talked when I was alive and you were you, but it’s really difficult,” Rosa says. She’s lying on Isobel’s bed, ass against the headboard with her legs stretched up against the wall.
> 
> She looks over at Isobel, who’s staring out her barred window. “Did you ever go to any of Kate’s boy/girl parties when we were in middle school?” Rosa asks, turning back to look at the ceiling. “I’m pretty sure that’s the only time we would have hung out, but I don’t remember seeing you.” 
> 
> She sighs and swings her legs down, spinning to sit on the edge of the bed to look at Isobel. “We were never friends then, but I think we would be now.” She shrugs as she leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “But maybe we wouldn’t be. I’d probably be a way different person now, if I had lived.” She stares at Isobel for a long moment before she says quietly, “But you’d probably be a way different person if he hadn’t done this to you, so. I guess we’ll never know, huh?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Y'all remember a couple months ago when I posted that RNM got me out of my writing funk and it helped me reach 100k total words posted on AO3? Well this chapter puts me over 100k words just in RNM in 5 months. What even???
> 
> Anyways, I have jury duty this week, and school starts, so hopefully I'll be at work more often. Next chapter's planned out, but idk when it will be done...
> 
> Many thanks to insidiousintent for your help with the chapter again!

Isobel has had herself locked in a room at the hospital, so Rosa spends most of her time over the next couple of weeks there with her. It’s a useless way of comforting her, but Rosa knows how lonely it can be when you’re locked in a room with nothing to do but sit and think about all the terrible things you’ve done when you weren’t yourself. Even if Isobel can’t see her, Rosa doesn’t want to leave her alone with those thoughts, especially because Isobel hasn’t done anything wrong.

“I’m trying to think of a time we may have talked when I was alive and you were you, but it’s really difficult,” Rosa says. She’s lying on Isobel’s bed, ass against the headboard with her legs stretched up against the wall.

She looks over at Isobel, who’s staring out her barred window. “Did you ever go to any of Kate’s boy/girl parties when we were in middle school?” Rosa asks, turning back to look at the ceiling. “I’m pretty sure that’s the only time we would have hung out, but I don’t remember seeing you.” 

She sighs and swings her legs down, spinning to sit on the edge of the bed to look at Isobel. “We were never friends then, but I think we would be now.” She shrugs as she leans forward to rest her elbows on her knees. “But maybe we wouldn’t be. I’d probably be a way different person now, if I had lived.” She stares at Isobel for a long moment before she says quietly, “But you’d probably be a way different person if he hadn’t done this to you, so. I guess we’ll never know, huh?” 

/

Noah sits outside her room for hours, day after day, the picture of a perfect, doting husband. Every once in a while, Rosa steps out to glare at him and mutter a string of curse words in Spanish before she goes back to sit with Isobel.

“Your husband is an asshole,” she tells Isobel, but she still sits next to her on the bed when Noah comes in to talk to her.

“I’m not going to give up on you,” he says, leaning in to grip Isobel’s hand.

Rosa hisses and stands up. “Yeah, because you love having a puppet readily available to you.”

“I’ll take time off work,” he continues, leaning in, eyes convincingly earnest. “I’ll take care of you. I...I just want things to go back to normal.”

Rosa bunches her fist and slugs him in the face. There’s no impact, of course, but she does feel a little better for trying. “Normal? Normal is you using her and lying to her and killing innocent people with no remorse! Fuck your normal!”

Isobel tells him she needs to talk to the doctor privately to see if there’s a treatment plan and he agrees to let her. Anything to get her out of the hospital and back into the real world so he can continue to play with her, Rosa supposes.

/

After Noah leaves for work, Isobel paces her room for a while, arms wrapped around herself while she works to keep her breathing even.

“It’s going to be okay, Is,” Rosa says, keeping in step with her. “Serial killers always make a mistake and give themselves away somehow. Now that they’re looking into it, they’ll find something.”

Isobel finally shakes her head and takes a deep breath, leaning against her dresser and zoning out for a minute.

Rosa stands in front of her, brow furrowed. “Isobel?”

A minute later Kyle walks in, hands shoved into his lab coat pockets, an odd air surrounding him. “Kyle?” Rosa asks, stepping in front of him to look up into his eyes. They’re dead. Cold. Very un-Kyle-like.

He exhales slowly and says to Isobel, “You killed Rosa Ortecho.”

Isobel straightens and faces Kyle head-on. “Yes,” she says, sounding unrepentant, which...is not right.

Rosa turns back to her and shakes her head. “What?”

Kyle steps forward and Rosa moves with him, standing to the side so she can watch them both. She tilts her head, looking both of them up and down. There’s something weird going on, and she can’t quite--

Kyle lifts his hand out of his coat pocket and jams a syringe into Isobel’s chest, causing both her and Rosa to gasp.

“Kyle!” Rosa yells, jumping forward to wrap her hand around his on the syringe as he finishes pressing it down. “What are you--” She sees the last of the blue liquid in the syringe and glares up at Isobel’s shocked face, suddenly realizing what’s going on. “You idiot!”

Kyle pulls the syringe out and shakes his head, eyes clearing to their normal warm brown. He looks down at the syringe in horror and says, “What the fuck!”

/

Kyle pages Liz to Isobel’s room, and then stands frozen, staring down at the syringe in his hand in confusion. Isobel smirks and sits down on her bed. Rosa paces between them, yelling at Isobel about what a shitty decision that was, for multiple reasons.

Liz walks in a few minutes later, brow furrowed in confusion, but when she sees the syringe in Kyle’s outstretched hand she rushes forward to grab it. “I just told you we don’t know the side effects, so why would you--”

“He didn’t!” Rosa growls, moving so Liz and Kyle are between her and Isobel.

Kyle shakes his head and says, “I don’t know Liz, I just...did it.” He looks over at Isobel and back to Liz. “I shouldn’t have. It goes completely against my code.”

Liz turns to Isobel when she says, voice dripping with sarcasm, “Yeah, Dr. Valenti. Terrible bedside manner.” She massages her chest where Kyle had injected her.

“Shut up, Isobel!” Rosa yells, fists clenched at her sides.

Liz seems to get it then. “She incepted you,” she tells Kyle, and his gaze whips to her. “She jumped into your brain, and she convinced you that this is the right thing to do.”

He looks over at Isobel and says, “That’s her power? Mind control?”

Isobel sighs and says, “It’s not _control_ so much as it is...influence. I’m an influencer.”

Liz rolls her eyes and says, “Oh, God.”

Rosa just clenches her jaw and screams, crossing her arms over her chest.

Liz’s phone beeps and she looks down at it. Frustrated, she turns to Kyle and says, “Okay, Kyle, just… text me if she exhibits any reactions!” She leaves before they can stop her and Rosa is half-tempted to follow, but she thinks her other sibling needs her more, so she stays.

Kyle turns back to Isobel and sighs. “Why would you do this?”

Isobel shrugs and adjusts her shirt, not meeting his eyes. “I killed Rosa,” she says matter-of-factly.

Kyle sucks in a breath and Rosa steps up next to him, resting her hand in the middle of his back. “I heard,” he says. “What does that have to do with you making me inject you with an untested serum?”

Isobel lets out a long, slow breath and finally looks up to meet his eyes. “I’m dangerous. I need to be stopped.”

Kyle holds her gaze a little longer before he nods. “I have to check on some patients, but I’ll be back in a little while.”

Isobel nods back and turns away as he leaves.

Rosa sighs and says, “I’m pissed at you right now, but I’m also worried what that serum’s going to do to you. So I’m leaving, but I’ll be back later, when I don’t feel like strangling you with your own hair.”

/

Kyle hasn’t gotten far, just down to the nurse’s station to tell them to page him if anything happens with Isobel, as she hasn’t been feeling well.

Rosa follows him down to the elevator, where they ride in silence, except for the sound of Kyle’s shaky breathing. She can see his hands clenched into fists at his sides and she sighs.

He pastes on a smile as they pass the nurse’s station down on his normal floor and rushes down to the single-person bathroom in the on-call room. Rosa hesitates to follow him in there, but when she hears the sink running, she peeks her head in and takes a chance. 

He’s standing at the sink, scooping up handfuls of water to splash on his face. He turns off the water and reaches for a handful of paper towels, drying his face slowly. When he’s done, he stands with his eyes closed and exhales slowly. “It wasn’t me,” he whispers, shaking his head. “It was Isobel, it wasn’t me.”

His breaths are a little shaky. Rosa sighs and stands next to him, running her hand across his back. “It wasn’t you,” she says quietly.

He collapses onto the closed toilet and drops his head into his hands, fingers running through his hair. “It wasn’t me. I wouldn’t do that. I--” He shakes his head and lets out another shaky breath.

Rosa kneels on the floor in front of him, bringing her arms up to hover over his shoulders; the closest she can get to giving him a comforting hug. “You’re not that guy anymore, I know. You wouldn’t do that.” She tilts her head so they would be brushing foreheads if she still had a body, and starts humming comforting sounds to him.

They sit like that for another minute until someone knocks on the bathroom door, and he inhales sharply through his nose and sits up, nodding. “It wasn’t me.”

Rosa stands up with him and nods. “It was Isobel. You have nothing to feel guilty about.”

He spends the next hour checking in on patients and she follows him, both to keep an eye on him and make sure he’s not carrying the weight of Isobel’s stupid decisions with him and because she’s not quite ready to see Isobel again.

She may care about the Ice Queen and be actively hoping she can get out from under her manipulative, piece of shit husband, but she also loves her little brother, and anyone who fucks with her brother has to deal with her.

/

Rosa is less angry and Kyle is more balanced when they make their way back to Isobel’s room an hour later. They can hear her voice through the door, though, which does not bode well for whoever’s in there with her.

They enter to hear her say, “You don’t know what this is like for me. I can’t trust my own mind!” She stands up when Kyle comes in, lips pressed together.

Max is there, and so is Michael, who turns when they walk in and rolls his eyes. “Great. This guy.”

Rosa rolls her eyes and moves past him, running her hand down his arm on the way. “Easy, Mikey. He’s helping.” She stands next to Isobel and sighs.

Kyle stops a few feet from them, settles back onto his heels. “The room’s private, not soundproof,” he reminds them.

Max has his arms crossed over his chest. “Where’s Liz?” he asks.

“She’s trying to live her life,” Kyle says. “To get some distance from the homicidal alien,” he looks around Max at Isobel.

Rosa scrunches her nose and shakes her head. She looks over at Isobel to see her glaring down Kyle, and Rosa is familiar with that look. “What the fuck, Isobel!” she yells, pushing past Max and Michael to stand by Kyle again.

He shifts away from Isobel, just a little, and says, “Whoa.”

Isobel’s brows furrow as she focuses harder, and Rosa’s eyes widen. “No way.”

“What are you doing?” Kyle asks, and Max and Michael both turn to look at her in unison.

“I’m trying to get you to take off your shirt, but…” Isobel’s voice softens, “It’s not working.” Her shoulders drop in relief and she looks between her brothers and says, smile on her face, “It’s like I’m broken.”

Michael shifts closer to her, fingers twitching at his sides, and exchanges a look with Max.

“I think the serum worked,” Isobel tells them, eyes wide with shock.

“Holy shit,” Rosa says, hands coming up to cover her mouth. 

Michael turns away from Isobel, heading for the door, and she can see the fear and rage in his eyes. He moves to leave and she wants to go comfort him, but she also wants to stay with Isobel and make sure she’s okay. If she is, they’re one step closer to stopping Noah.

/

Rosa sits with Isobel for a long time, until Noah comes to visit, and then she figures, since Isobel is doing so well, she can take off for a little while. “I’ll be back in a bit,” she says to Isobel, sending a glare over at Noah for good measure before she leaves.

She leaves for thirty minutes, max, to check in on her dad during the lunch rush at the Crashdown, and when she comes back Isobel is sheet white, lying in her bed with blood dribbling out of her mouth.

Max is leaning over her, hand glowing red on her chest.

“What _happened_?” Rosa screams, running to the other side of the bed and sitting down next to Isobel’s hip. She lifts her hand to Isobel’s cheek, looking over at the others in horror. “Liz?”

Liz exchanges a panicked look with Michael while Max screams and the lights around them flicker.

Michael steps forward and grabs Max’s shoulder, pulling him away from her. “You have to stop,” he says, voice shaking.

Max shakes his head. “I’m gonna try again.” He’s sweating and red and he does not look well.

“It’s not working, Max,” Isobel groans, and Rosa’s gaze snaps back to her. “I’m not injured. You can’t heal me.”

Rosa scoots closer, dropping her hand to the pillow next to Isobel’s head. “No, but you were injected with a-a-a poison, so that counts, right?” she says, panicked, and she looks back to Michael for a confirmation she won’t receive while Max screams, trying to heal her again.

The lights blow out and Max sways away from Isobel. Rosa twitches, wanting to stand and help him, but Michael catches him, helps him move to a chair, and asks, “You gonna barf?”

Max shakes his head and says, sounding a little petulant, “No.”

Michael leans over to grab a bedpan and shoves it into Max’s hands a second before Max leans over and pukes into it.

A surprised laugh bursts from Rosa’s chest. She looks back to Isobel, sure she’ll see her smiling at her brothers acting like real brothers again, but she’s still lying there, pale and sickly looking. Rosa’s smile drops and she takes a deep breath.

“What now?” Michael asks Kyle, and he sounds like he’s ready to throw a punch.

Kyle looks over at Liz, but she’s staring wide-eyed at Isobel. “I’d normally suggest making phone calls to loved ones,” he says, looking between Michael and Max.

Max shakes his head, breathing hard. “We... There has to be something more we can do,” he says, voice shaking.

“We should call Mom,” Isobel says, and Rosa makes a sound in her throat, shaking her head.

Max turns to her and says, “No. No.” His voice breaks this time, tears streaming down his cheeks.

Isobel looks scared, but she swallows and says, “Max.”

He shakes his head again and gets unsteadily to his feet. He stumbles over to Liz and takes her hands. “Liz, you--you created this stuff. You can create the antidote.”

Rosa looks back down to Isobel, who has closed her eyes and is working on taking slow, even breaths. “She can, Is. She can do this.”

“There’s not enough time,” Liz says, and Rosa turns back to watch her warding him off, hands outstretched.

“What are you talking about?” Rosa asks, standing up and stepping closer to her.

Liz shakes her head and turns away from Max, running out of Isobel’s room. Rosa takes off after her, yelling, “Liz!”

/

Liz bolts back to her lab, but once she gets inside the door, she stands utterly still.

Rosa walks around her and faces her. “Liz?”

Her sister’s eyes are flickering all around the lab, but they don’t spend more than a second in any one place. Her breathing is getting faster. Before she can spiral into a full-blown panic attack, she closes her eyes and takes a deep breath in. She pushes her shoulders back and nods, exhaling slowly through her nose. “Okay,” she says, and repeats the exercise twice more before opening her eyes.

“You okay?” Rosa asks, following her around as Liz walks slowly around her lab, running her hand across the counter, the glass beakers, the pages of notes she and Dr. Avila have compiled for their study. 

Liz stops on the notebook she’s been using for her notes on aliens and takes a deep breath, closing her eyes again. Rosa watches her quietly, willing her to come up with something.

Liz shakes her head and opens her eyes, letting out a frustrated groan. “No, okay,” she says, shaking her upper body and breathing deep again. “You can figure this out, you’ve just gotta…” She picks up the notebook and starts for the door. “You’ve just gotta get a little bit Rosa,” she murmurs as she heads out.

Rosa pauses in the doorway as she hears that, then runs to catch up to Liz. “What the hell does that mean?”

/

It means Liz goes home, cracks open a bottle of wine, and lays out on the roof of the Crashdown, blasting Alanis in her headphones.

Rosa paces around her, biting her thumb, and humming along to Liz’s humming as she tries to come up with something to help Isobel.

Several minutes into the ritual, the roof door opens and Michael slams it shut, stalking over to them. “The hell you doing?” he yells at her.

Liz jolts up, pulling off her sunglasses as Michael continues, “Max thinks you’re in your lair, mixing up a miracle cure for Isobel!”

“I am working on it, okay?” she yells up at him, and he turns away, shaking his head. She continues, “Rosa got all the creative juice in my family. The art and dance and poetry genes were used up by the time I came along, so when I need to get creative, I turn to wine and Jagged Little Pill, channel my inner Rosa.”

Rosa bursts out laughing, shaking her head. “You _know_ that’s not true, right?” She smirks and crosses her arms over her chest, raising an eyebrow at her. “That’s not even how genetics work, Miss Three Science Degrees.”

Michael’s shoulders drop and he moves to lean back against the wall across from Liz. “Did you come up with anything?” he asks, voice a little hollow.

Rosa leans back next to him, her arm centimeters away from his.

“Yeah,” Liz says, shrugging and looking up at him. “You.”

Michael stiffens next to her and keeps his eyes fixed on Liz as she stands up.

“You’re a secret genius,” Liz says as she stands in front of him. “I could never figure out why you didn’t go to school.”

Michael juts out his chin, a challenge. Rosa leans closer and wraps her arm around his back.

“But then I realized,” Liz continues, voice softening. “What you want to learn, they don’t teach at UNM.”

Michael nods, very softly, and his eyes become shiny. Rosa makes a comforting noise and puts her forehead on his shoulder.

“What do you know, Michael?” Liz asks. “What kind of alien science do you have up your sleeve?”

“Nothing I can trust you with,” he says, voice rough, and he looks away from her.

“You can though,” Rosa whispers into the sleeve of his jacket. “You can, Mikey, and it might be the only way to save Isobel. You two working together?” she says, pulling back and looking between the two of them. “You could do it.”

“I am trying to help you,” Liz says.

Michael shakes his head, pushing away from the wall to move closer to her. “Max may not see you, but I do,” he says. “How you _manipulated_ him into being your lab rat, how you _use_ him and Valenti.”

Rosa sighs and buries her face in her hands when he starts talking about how Isobel killed her, so of course Liz wouldn’t want to save her. “This is getting us nowhere!” she yells at them. “Why can’t you just put your shit aside for five minutes and work together to save Isobel!”

“I’m gonna go back to the hospital,” he finishes. “I can’t let Max watch her die alone.”

Rosa makes a noise of protest and Liz grabs Michael’s arm, dragging him back in front of her. “I can’t let him watch her die at all,” Liz says to him. “Help me.”

He inhales slowly, searching her eyes, and nods. “Come with me.”

/

Michael takes Liz to his bunker, and when she sees them start talking science together, she knows they’re going to figure this out, so she goes back to check on Isobel.

Kyle’s in her room, switching out her bags of fluids, and Isobel stirs awake just in time to see him doing it. “What is that?” she asks.

Rosa sits on the end of her bed, facing Kyle, and places her hand on Isobel’s foot next to her.

“Straight nail polish remover,” Kyle says. “It won’t solve any problems, but neither does morphine.”

Rosa snorts and leans back, reclining on her elbows. “I don’t know. I never partook, but I heard it’s quite a ride.” She looks over at Isobel, pale and sickly, and her joking smile falls away. “Sorry,” she whispers to her.

“I don’t understand why you’re being so nice to me,” Isobel says to Kyle. Her eyes flicker to his and away again. “You know what I did.”

Kyle takes a breath and starts telling her about his first day of his internship in Idaho. “I remember that day,” Rosa whispers, shuddering. She’d spent the whole day with him as he rushed from bloody, injured child to bloody, injured child, doing his best to help them and comfort them and save who he could. It had been awful.

He finishes recounting the memory to Isobel and ends with, “In a hospital, it doesn’t matter what someone did before they came through the doors.”

Isobel nods her understanding and says, “Then I’m not a murderer. I’m just a…” she sucks in a shuddery breath and shrugs, looking down at herself. “Dying girl.”

“No,” Kyle says firmly, and Isobel meets his eyes again. “In here, you’re not dying until you’re dead.”

Isobel lets out a heavy sigh. “Thank you,” she says softly. Rosa rubs her hand over Isobel’s foot again.

Kyle shrugs and shakes his head. “You don’t have to thank me for doing my job.”

Isobel shakes her head and swallows. “No, but you didn’t have to tell me that, or try to make me feel better.”

Rosa rolls over and leans her cheek on Isobel’s leg. “That’s kind of what he does though. Comforts people in pain.”

Kyle just nods to acknowledge Isobel’s thanks and moves around her bed toward the door. Before he gets far, Isobel calls out to him and he stops, turning back with a raised brow.

“I--,” she clears her throat and says, “I’m sorry about earlier. I could feel your anger about what I did to Rosa and I used that anger to manipulate you into doing something you wouldn’t have otherwise.”

Kyle takes a step back toward them and says slowly, “I appreciate your apology.” Rosa can feel some tension leave Isobel’s body next to her and pats her comfortingly. Kyle’s hand twitches at his side and he turns to the door before turning back again and meeting Isobel’s eyes. “Can I ask, how do you _know_ I wouldn’t have done it otherwise?”

Isobel spends a silent moment searching his eyes before she says, “You were difficult to convince. If you hadn’t just been shaken to the core from finding out the truth, I doubt I would have been able to make you do it at all.” She shrugs and shakes her head. “It’s hard to make someone go completely against their strongest convictions unless they’ve been compromised, like you were.”

Rosa bounces off the bed and over to Kyle, resting her hands on his arms as she leans up to press a kiss to the air above his cheek. “That means you’re a good man, Kyle.”

/

Isobel falls asleep shortly after Kyle leaves, and despite wanting to keep an eye on her and make sure she gets better, there’s only so much pacing around a quiet room Rosa can do before she goes crazy.

She takes a careful look at Isobel and lets out a long sigh. “I promise I’ll be back in a half hour. I just need to get out of here for a little while.”

She’d seen Mimi earlier in the morning, drinking tea and reading a novel out on the grounds of Sunset Mesa, so she supposes Alex would be good to check in on about now; he is, after all, up to _something_ and in desperate need of keeping an eye on.

Rosa chokes on that thought when she appears in the middle of the Project Shepherd bunker to see Jesse Manes zip-tied to a chair and Alex digging through boxes of files on the table behind him.

She circles Manes with a raised brow and looks over at Alex. “This what you’ve been working on, honey?” She drops down in front of Manes and looks up at him, sees the pent-up rage and frustration in the man’s eyes. “Because I’ve gotta say, this is the sexiest damn thing I’ve ever seen you do.” She smirks over Manes’ shoulder at Alex.

“Why are you trying to frame Michael?” Alex asks, and Rosa stands quickly, eyebrows going up. “Haven’t you done enough to him?”

“How’d you know he’s eyeing Michael?” Rosa asks him. She eyes the boxes and papers on the table in front of her, then turns to look around the rest of the bunker. She freezes when she sees a series of files open on the computer screens, one of which labels Michael as a level red threat. She sucks in a breath and turns back to Manes, bunching her fists. “You asshole!” she snarls over at him.

Manes is going on and on about how Michael’s been targeting Alex for years, and that he’s just trying to protect the planet from the aliens’ assault. “Liar!” Rosa yells, stalking over to him. “You think hurting them and _torturing_ them and _experimenting_ on them is for the greater good?” He calls them monsters and Rosa shakes her head, leaning down to look him in the eye, inches from his face. “They’re not the monsters, _you_ are.”

“It’s all there,” Manes tells Alex, referring to the files Alex is looking over. “Incident after incident of unprovoked violence against innocent--”

Rosa’s rolling her eyes and shaking her head, but she jumps when Alex turns to Manes and yells, “Do _not_ talk to me about unprovoked violence! Do you hear me?” He turns back to the files, but changes his mind and looks to Manes again. “And you are _not_ looking for justice. You are using this operation to target people that you hate.” He takes a deep breath. “And that stops right now.”

Rosa walks around Manes to stand next to him, watching as he breathes deep. His hands are shaking--from fear or rage, she doesn’t know which--but she wraps a hand around his bicep and nods. “You’re right. You’re doing the right thing.”

She stays while Alex boxes up the files he’s been skimming, and watches Manes while Alex works his magic to lock him out of his own computers. She feels a simultaneous thrill and fear for Alex when she sees Manes’ jaw clench at that, hands tightening into fists.

Alex then cuts Manes’ bindings and tells him he’s going to leave Roswell and stay away. He walks over to pick up Manes’ gun and says, “If you decide not to do as I say, I’ll expose you.” He steps forward, standing above his father, and Rosa sucks in a breath. “You’ll be dishonorably discharged. That will be your legacy. Not much of a Manes man,” he _taunts_ him, holding the gun out.

Rosa steps forward, shaking her head and holding her hands out, palms out. “Alex,” she says quietly, eyes wide as she watches Manes reach forward for his gun.

“Enjoy your freedom, Pops,” Alex says.

Manes takes it and rises from his chair. Alex steps forward, moving into his space, looking down his nose at him. Rosa moves closer as well, hands held out between them, wishing she could push them apart if Manes decides to attack Alex.

But he doesn’t. Manes quietly makes his way to the bunker door and exits, Alex’s eyes on his back the whole time. Rosa watches the tension drain from Alex’s whole body when the door shuts behind Manes. She lets out a low whistle and shakes her head. “Damn, that was some big dick energy, my friend!”

He steps forward and leans down, planting his palms flat on the table and dropping his head between his shoulders. He takes a minute to breathe deep, slowly inhaling and exhaling to counts of ten.

Rosa lifts herself up to sit on the table next to him and places one of her hands over one of his. “I’m proud of you, Alex. That was gutsy and brave and I know it must have scared you out of your mind to do it, but you did it. You came out on top with him for once, and I am so damn proud of you for it.”

/

She only leaves Alex a _little_ later than her promised half hour, but by then, Isobel’s en route to somewhere, lying down in the back of Max’s jeep. Rosa scrambles over the center console into the front and looks back at her. “What’s going on?” she asks, looking from Isobel over to Max, who is driving less like a cop and more like Dominic Toretto.

He doesn’t answer, of course, just keeps driving with his foot on the gas and his hand on the gearshift. It doesn’t take long for Rosa to recognize the desert surrounding the mines, though. Her suspicions are confirmed when they skid to a stop next to Michael’s truck at the base of the hill outside their pods’ cave.

Max lifts Isobel out of the back and Rosa scrambles out of the jeep to follow them. They walk slowly, Max’s arm around Isobel’s waist, her hand clutching his shirt. “Max, I need you to do something for me,” she says, gasping when she stumbles over a rock and loses her balance. Rosa leaps toward her, hands outstretched.

Max grips Isobel tighter, righting her and shaking his head as they continue to the cave. “You’re not _dying_ , so I don’t need to do anything for you, Is.”

Isobel coughs and laughs humorlessly. “Noah will wonder where I went,” she says, ignoring Max’s statement. “I need you to let him know I’m okay, and that I love him, and--”

Rosa growls and rolls her eyes, moving around them to step inside, but she stops at the mouth of the cave when she sees them stop just outside.

Max looks down at Isobel. “Isobel,” he says, sighing when she glares up at him, gripping his shirt tighter to pull him down. “Fine. I’ll tell him you’re okay and that you love him.”

Her eyes search his face for a long moment before she nods and says, “Thank you.”

They make their way into the cave, where Liz is waiting with Michael, who leaps forward to support Isobel’s other side. Rosa steps out of his way to stand by Liz.

“How long is she gonna be in there?” Max asks Liz, and that’s when Rosa realizes they’re going to put Isobel into one of the pods.

“Could take months, years,” she says.

“Years!” Rosa’s eyebrows fly up in surprise. “You really think it will take that long?”

Liz is already assuring all of them they won’t stop until they find a way to save Isobel. Then, Michael and Max are assuring Isobel that if she exits the pods without her memories, they will remind her of who they are.

Liz and Michael have apparently figured out that a coating of silver around Isobel’s body will allow her to enter her pod, where she will be able to stay safely in stasis until they are able to find a cure for Liz’s serum. Liz helps Isobel carefully coat her body in liquid silver, and Rosa sits next to her the whole time, hands clenching with the need to help.

She swallows hard and shakes away the thought that Noah had been the one to put _her_ body in his pod all those years ago, and he must have done something similar to her.

After Isobel is settled in her pod, curled up with her eyes closed and safe from the serum, from Noah, from...everything for the first time in fifteen years, Michael, Liz, and Max pack up all of the equipment Liz had brought to the cave.

Liz and Max look like they have more they want to say to each other, but Michael hasn’t said a word since Isobel went into the pod, and his eyes haven’t been dry all day. Rosa decides he needs her more than the other two do, so she accompanies _him_ home.

/

When Michael gets home, he slams the door shut on his truck before striding in the direction of the Airstream, hand outstretched. Rosa follows but skids to a halt when he stops suddenly in front of her, his gaze drawn to something in the open garage next to it. He changes direction, dropping his hand, and Rosa jogs to catch up.

He’s eyeing the sign from the Wild Pony, circling it and running his hand along the lights. As long as she’s been stalking him, Rosa’s figured out that when Michael’s emotional, he needs to work on something with his hands. A fight with Max? He needs to fix an engine. Isobel asks him to be in her wedding party? He needs to build her a garden fountain.

Alex’s unit is blown up on a mission, and Alex might not survive? Well, first he needs to get wasted at the Wild Pony and thrown into jail. Then he needs to spend three days in his bunker working on his ship.

Isobel nearly dies and needs to be put into stasis, and she may not remember him when she comes out? Michael needs to fix Maria’s sign.

“What’s wrong with it?” Rosa asks, ever-supportive of his habit of working out his emotions through physical labor.

He grumbles to himself as he continues to test the sign out, plugging it in and tinkering with parts of it until he figures out what’s wrong with it.

It doesn’t take him long to fix, and when he’s done he loads it up into the back of his truck and heads for the Wild Pony to drop it off. “You gonna be okay?” Rosa asks him from the passenger seat. He breathes deep once they’re in the parking lot, clenches the steering wheel hard before getting out and heading inside, pasting that charming grin of his on his face as he goes. Rosa sighs and follows after him.

He asks one of the guys at the bar to help him bring the sign in when he gets inside, and while Rosa is happy to hear his voice for the first time in several hours, it kind of sucks that it’s his fake easy-going voice.

He plugs in the sign and it lights up. Maria walks over and says, “That was quick.”

“Yeah,” Michael says, and his voice is rough. He’s dropping the act somewhat around Maria. “Really could’ve made a new one.” He leans up against one of the pool tables and looks warily down at her.

Rosa lets out a long breath and shrugs, leaning next to him. He probably could have used more of a challenge to keep his mind off of Isobel, but she knows what the sign means to Maria.

“I need this one,” Maria tells him. “My, my mom’s not doing great. She tends to wander. But no matter what, when she sees this sign, she-she knows she’s safe.” Maria smiles at the newly-repaired sign. “She knows it lights the way home.”

Michael considers her for a long moment while her eyes glide over the sign, then he looks over at it too. “Like a beacon,” he says, turning back to her.

Maria meets his eyes, still smiling. “Hmm,” she nods.

Rosa’s known Michael a long time, so she knows he’s going to say something dumb a second before he opens his mouth. “Don’t--” she says, leaping forward to cover his mouth with her hand.

“Figured it’d be something cheesy like that,” he says.

Maria recoils, scrunching her nose, and says, “Jerk,” before walking away.

Rosa’s arm flies out to hit Michael in the chest before she leaves him to follow Maria to the bar. She sits down at an empty stool close to the end of the bar, while she watches Maria organize and haul glasses back and forth from the kitchen. A minute later, Michael tries to sit down in her chair and she gets up, scowling.

“What do you want, Guerin?” Maria asks flatly, not even looking up from slicing limes on the counter in front of her.

“Wow, DeLuca, you greet all of your customers with that sunny attitude?” he asks, leaning closer and folding his arms neatly in front of him.

Rosa narrows her eyes at him and boosts herself up onto the bar next to them. “What are you doing?” she asks Michael, eyes searching his face.

Maria smiles sweetly and looks up at him, head tilted. “Only the ones who have a habit of not paying,” she says.

Michael rolls his eyes and leans closer, reaching into his back pocket as he does so. He pulls out a bill and waves it between their faces. “This good enough to garner a shot of the good stuff _and_ a genuine smile from the bartender?” he asks.

“Please tell me you are not angling for a pity fuck here,” Rosa says, attempting to smack him on the shoulder.

Maria’s lips twitch, barely, and she snatches the bill out of his hand. She pockets it without looking at it and rolls her eyes. “It’ll get you a shot, but no guarantees on the smile,” she says, pulling out a glass and setting it in front of him.

Michael gives her his best puppy eyes, which Rosa will admit, can be very persuasive, and says, “Aww, DeLuca, you’re breaking my heart.”

Rosa fake gags and shakes her head. “Okay, I know you’ve had, like, the shittiest day ever, but you do _not_ get to use my best friend to try to forget about it,” she tells him.

Maria pours his drink and he nods his thanks. She nods in return and gets back to slicing limes. “So, you gonna tell me why you feel like such a sad sack this evening, or do I have to guess?”

Rosa lets out a slow breath and nods, glad Maria’s picked up on his mopey attitude; she won’t be giving him a pity fuck, tonight at least.

Michael tilts his head to the side as he swallows a sip of his drink and shakes his head. “How about you guess, and I’ll tell you if you’re right.”

Rosa snorts and rolls her eyes. “No way she’s going to guess a sick sister was put into an alien incubation pod. I feel like that’s cheating, Michael.”

Maria hums as she starts cleaning up her work area and says, “Girl trouble?”

Michael lets out a short laugh and shakes his head. “Never. Come on, DeLuca, you know me better than that.”

Maria hums again and looks up at him, pausing in her work. “You’re right. I do.” Her eyes rove over him, searching, and Michael freezes in place, glass halfway to his mouth. “How about _you_ tell me a story about what happened and I’ll tell you if you’re lying or not?” she suggests.

His lips quirk and he nods, lowering the glass. “Okay. A strikingly handsome man kidnapped my little brother and I had to go on a harrowing journey to recover him from a dangerous place.”

Maria’s eyes narrow on him and Rosa has to cover her mouth with her hand to contain her giggles. “Lie,” Maria says flatly, then cocks her head to the side. “Isn’t that the plot to Labyrinth?”

Michael nods, half a genuine smile gracing his face. “I found a pirate ship full of treasure, but had to leave all of it behind to save my own life.”

“Lie. Goonies,” Maria says, fighting a smile.

Michael leans closer. “I had to break into the UFO Museum to steal back a forged alien artifact before--”

“Lie. How to Steal a Million.”

“I have to sub in for a friend in this dance competition--”

“Dirty Dancing.”

“I was trapped in a room with four weirdos for nine hours and--”  
  
Maria rolls her eyes and leans back, shaking her head. “Now you’re just being insulting,” she says.

Michael tilts his glass to her and says, “But I got you to smile, didn’t I?”

Maria freezes for a second, then her eyes flicker up to his. “You too, Guerin,” she says, smile softening, but still present.

It’s Michael’s turn to freeze, and then he shakes his head, laughing a little. “You got me there, DeLuca.”

Rosa, who had been watching their entire exchange like a tennis match, eyebrows raised high on her forehead, tilts her head to the side and looks between the two of them. “Well,” she says, sighing. “I don’t hate this, but it _is_ going to be damn complicated when Alex finds out, even if you two have finally called it quits.” Her eyes land on Michael, whose grin is widening as he continues to talk to Maria, eyes a warm gold, crinkling on the sides when he throws his head back and laughs.

“Oh boy,” Rosa says.


	9. Songs About Texas

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> For the next six weeks, Liz and Michael spend their evenings and weekends working on a cure for Liz’s serum. Rosa simultaneously loves and hates hanging out with them because on the one hand, they can excitedly talk science with each other for hours, bouncing ideas off of each other and bonding over their shared love of experimenting and learning. On the other hand, they can excitedly talk science with each other for hours, which is not Rosa’s favorite conversational topic, nor one she can easily keep up with them about, even after the countless lectures she’s sat in on with Liz and Kyle.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know I said I wanted to post weekly, but I knew I was going back to work and I wanted to take a couple weeks to try to write ahead, or at least write myself a buffer, thus the delay in posting this chapter. The next two chapters are mostly done, so I'll probably post one next week, and one the week after that. Hopefully by then the last two chapters will be done, so I can finally finish the Practical Magic AU, or write stripper!Kyle, or Cam pegging Kyle (those two only if I can get up the nerve to try smut again), or another installment of give michael guerin a friend. I love Rosa, but writing a long fic from one POV has been really hard.
> 
> Anyways, I got the episode dialogue from transcripts.foreverdreaming.org.
> 
> HUGE THANKS TO INSIDIOUSINTENT because Rosa and I were fighting about the Alex-Michael-Maria love triangle and their advice on how to deal with it was i-n-v-a-l-u-a-b-l-e.

For the next six weeks, Liz and Michael spend their evenings and weekends working on a cure for Liz’s serum. Rosa simultaneously loves and hates hanging out with them because on the one hand, they can excitedly talk science with each other for _hours_ , bouncing ideas off of each other and bonding over their shared love of experimenting and learning. On the other hand, they can excitedly talk _science_ with each other for hours, which is not Rosa’s favorite conversational topic, nor one she can easily keep up with them about, even after the countless lectures she’s sat in on with Liz and Kyle.

When not at the hospital with Liz or doing his actual job at Sanders’, Michael’s at the Wild Pony, flirting outrageously with Maria. Rosa never stays long once they really get going, and she’s growing increasingly frustrated with Michael for flirting with Maria when he _knows_ she’s good friends with Alex. Michael’s not exactly a social butterfly, but even he must be aware of the hazards of getting between two friends. It’s also frustrating because she knows a lot about Michael’s history with Alex. Left hand: they’ve been in love with each other for a long time, even if they’re too chickenshit to admit it to each other. Right hand: it seems like they’re incapable of making each other happy long-term, and she only wants them to be happy. That being said, she’s not mad at Michael for trying to move on; she’s angry at him for trying to move on with _Maria_. 

Maria, being totally oblivious to the minefield she’s starting to tiptoe in, has also been on the lookout for alternative methods to help Mimi. Mimi continues to deteriorate, and none of the doctors Maria take her to seem to know what’s happening. But from what Rosa can see, Mimi’s a lot more connected now, and despite her excitement at finally being noticed, she doesn’t want it at the cost of Mimi’s health.

Meanwhile, Alex is on a fact-finding bender, the likes of which Rosa hasn’t seen since he was overseas. Rosa is starting to get concerned at how much time he’s spending in the Project Shepherd bunker, going through old files and digging through all of the hard drives. He does reach out to Kyle, letting him know that he’s safe from Jesse’s stalking and blackmailing about aliens, which leads to a truly entertaining conversation about what each of them knows about the aliens in Roswell, but other than that single conversation and his work on-base, Alex has effectively buried himself in government alien propaganda.

Jesse Manes kept his word and went to Niger, but Rosa’s seen him on the phone with Flint a lot, which does not bode well for him _staying_ in Niger, or letting go of Project Shepherd altogether. A worrying prospect for sure, but it’s on the backburner for her until he actually comes back to town.

Noah is a much more pressing concern. He’s searching everywhere for Isobel, calling hospitals and rehab centers in New Mexico, Arizona, and Texas looking for her. He’s also kicking up a major fuss with the Roswell Sheriff’s department, claiming Max has something to do with Isobel’s ‘disappearance.’ Rosa has to roll her eyes at his antics; she knows he’s only mad because for the first time in fifteen years, Isobel’s finally out of his sphere of influence.

Isobel’s fine. Rosa visits her every day, making sure she’s secure in her pod, safely frozen in stasis while Max reads boring old books to her. Sometimes she sits leaning up against Isobel’s pod and watches Max, closing her eyes and relaxing to the steady sound of his voice. When his voice sounds most tired and defeated, she sits leaning up against his legs, wrapping her arms around him in comfort. She ends up sitting with him a lot.

Once again, the only person in Rosa’s life death who is remotely emotionally stable is her father. His health is improving on his new diet, and he seems to be doing well. However, Rosa has seen him shooting worried looks Liz’s way when she works late nights and weekends, along with puzzled looks when he realizes she’s spending so much time with _Michael_ instead of Max.

/

Rosa’s hanging out with Maria at the bar one afternoon when things come to a head between Alex and Michael. Alex and Maria are sitting at the bar chatting about Mimi’s worsening condition when Michael walks up. The last time Rosa had seen them together, Michael and Maria had been flirting like crazy again, and Rosa had left to check in on her brother. From the way Maria says, “Tequila or whiskey?” to him, it seems like maybe the night had ended with another argument instead of flirty banter.

“Whatever’s cheaper,” he says to her, and she rolls her eyes and walks into the back room. Rosa would follow, but the mildly panicked look on Alex’s face and the way he lets out a slow, controlled exhale tells her this is not a confrontation she wants to miss.

Michael walks up to the stool directly next to Alex and sets his hat down on the counter. “You lost the crutch,” he says, looking Alex up and down.

Alex finishes his beer in a long pull and says, “Yeah, it was slowing me down.” He stands up and starts pulling out his wallet to pay.

“Oh, you don’t have to leave,” Michael says mildly.

“I was on my way out,” Alex says, throwing him a fake smile over his shoulder.

Rosa rolls her eyes. “Liar.” She slides into his seat as he slides out, leaning her elbow on the back of the stool and resting her chin in her hand as she turns to continue spying on their conversation.

Michael’s face falls at Alex’s easy dismissal, and Rosa groans when he reaches out. “Hey,” he says loudly, pulling Alex around to look at him. He lowers his voice and Rosa has to lean forward to hear. “Is this really how it ends? Sex was epic.”

Alex turns away at this, rolling his eyes, and Rosa sticks her tongue out, fake-gagging.

Michael continues, leaning down to try to catch Alex’s eyes again, “So shouldn’t the breakup involve some pyrotechnics? Scream? Break some stuff?”

Rosa sighs and she sees Alex swallow hard and break eye contact with Michael again.

“Really make it feel over,” Michael finishes.

“Was that a question or a command, Michael?” Rosa asks quietly. Her eyes flicker over to Alex, whose eyes are searching Michael’s, and her heart sinks because she knows from the look on his face what he’s about to do. “Oh, no.”

“Sometimes the world ends with a whimper, Guerin,” he says, stepping just a little bit closer to him; a challenge, or a warning. Either way, he went for the gut shot and hit the mark spectacularly.

Rosa lets out a long breath and shakes her head as she watches him leave. “Jesus, Alex. Does it ever occur to you to pull your punches, even a little?”

She turns back to watch Michael as his gaze follows Alex to the door. She lets out a frustrated groan and slams her hands on the back of her stool. “Is that what you were hoping for?” she asks, watching him as he turns back around and starts flirting with Maria again. “Confirmation that it’s finally over for closure, so you can really try to make a go of it with Maria?” She shakes her head at him and licks her lips. “Because it looked to me like you were hoping he’d confirm it _wasn’t_ over, and if that’s the case, you continuing to hit on Maria while still pining for Alex is a dick move, and will earn you a demotion on my list of favorite aliens.”

She stands up when he does, follows him as he makes his way over to Max’s booth. She sighs and slides into the booth while he talks to Max. She says, “I know that was pretty final on Alex’s part, and I know you really do like Maria, but I’m gonna need you to back off before you one, put her in an awkward position with Alex, and more importantly, before you make her fall for you when you are clearly not ready to reciprocate.”

He’s not listening to her, of course. He’s focused on Max, who’s talking about a faith healer in Texas whose flyer contains the alien symbol on Max’s back. “The traveling show stops outside McLean tomorrow. And this woman, Arizona, claims to have the power to heal in her right hand,” Max says.

Michael slides into the booth next to Rosa and she leans up on her knees to get another look at the flyer on the table. Her eyebrows go up as she reads it over. “I suppose she could be an alien. There are a lot in Caulfield, but Noah escaped the crash, and you guys did too. There could be others out there.”

Michael is more skeptical. “You think this crack’s one of us,” he says, doubt clear in his voice.

“I don’t know,” Max admits, leaning across the table and keeping his voice down. “But I think she’s the first person we’ve encountered that might know something. You said this symbol might be a beacon. Let’s heed the call.”

Michael rolls his eyes and sighs. “Fine. But you’re paying for gas _and_ snacks,” he says, pointing at Max.

Max gives a half smile and nods in agreement.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up and she shrugs. “Guess we’re going on a road trip?”

/

The next morning, as Max and Michael are heading out of town, Rosa checks in on Liz. She and Kyle are bent over some microscopes, and from the sound of it, Liz’s newest shot at a cure for the serum is working.

“Yes!” Rosa says, moving in to take a look when Kyle and Liz step away to talk.

“Liz, you can’t leave her in that pod forever,” Kyle says. “We don’t put people in eggs, no matter how much she sucks.”

Rosa snorts and rolls her eyes, turning to look at them by the window. “She knows that,” Rosa says, just as Liz says the same.

Liz sighs and says, “This is so much easier with rats.”

There’s a brief pause before Kyle sighs and says, “It took me a long time to learn that most times, when I call time of death for a patient, it’s not because I killed them. It’s because I couldn’t save them. There’s a difference.”

Rosa steps forward and runs her hand down his arm, leaning up to kiss his cheek while Liz resumes panicking about needing to get the cure right.

The door opens and Kyle says, “Nope, nope!” It’s loud enough to stop Liz’s tangent, which is a good thing because Maria walks in. “I refuse to concede,” he continues. “Because _Die Hard_ is not a frickin’ Christmas movie. Maria will back me up on this.”

Rosa bursts into giggles and nods up at him. “Nice save, dude, but we all know it is.”

Maria scrunches up her nose and agrees with her, stating, “Hans Gruber is undeniably the Grinch.”

Secret still under wraps, he takes off and Maria steps further into Liz’s lab. They exchange a joke about how much Liz works, then Liz asks how she’s doing.

“Honestly? Not awesome. Mom’s getting much worse,” Maria says on a sigh. Rosa nods and leans back against the counter between them, biting her lip.

Liz inhales and starts patting her pockets, looking for her phone. “Okay, I’m gonna make a call. There is a drug trial happening at UCLA…”

Maria shakes her head and grabs her hands to still them. “No, I didn’t come here for a doctor, or a scientist. I...want to look into another option.”

Rosa raises a brow and says, “What are you talking about?”

Liz puts her phone away and says, “Okay, what is it?”

Maria bites her lip and searches Liz’s face before finally pulling out her phone. “I know it’s super last minute, and I know this definitely isn’t your kind of thing, but…” She flips the screen around to show Liz, and Rosa leans in to see a flyer for the same woman Michael and Max just left to see.

Rosa looks up at her and says, “Did you pick this up from him last night somehow?”

Liz reads it over, eyebrows high on her forehead.

“I know!” Maria says. “I know you don’t believe in mysticism or magic or whatever you want to call this, but I am out of options at this point.” She bites her lip and leans down a little to catch Liz’s eyes.

Liz finally looks up and locks eyes with her. “Magic’s just science we don’t understand yet,” she murmurs, lips twisting.

Maria huffs out a laugh and shakes her head. “Okay, were you quoting Arthur C. Clark or Jane Foster just then, because I can’t tell.”

Liz smiles and shrugs. “Doesn’t matter.” She twists her wrist to check the time and says, “If we leave now we can be there by mid-afternoon.”

Maria’s smile widens and she nods, reaching out to take Liz’s hands. “Thank you.”

“Looks like I’m going on two road trips,” Rosa says.

/

It’s a long drive, but sitting between Max and Michael in his truck, it feels infinitely longer. Rosa doesn’t remember much about the aliens from high school, but she does know the three of them were tight, and that the last ten years have been hard on Max and Michael’s relationship. This is evidenced by the stilted, superficial conversations they have on the road, when they bother talking at all. It’s awkward as hell and Rosa hates it.

By contrast, the cab of Maria’s truck is loud, filled with music and laughter and loud conversation. It’s a much more pleasant place to spend a five hour drive, so she sticks with them for most of it.

The four of them meet up almost right away when they find the ‘Rejuvenation Center’ and Michael wastes no time flirting with Maria again.

“Ugh!” Rosa says, stomping her foot as she follows Michael following Maria to the lemonade table. “Michael Guerin, you stop that right now! I know you haven’t gotten over Alex in the last fifteen hours!”

She steps between them as they stop at the edge of the table, facing each other. “Don’t you do it!” she yells, pointing up at him.

“Admit it, DeLuca. You like me, just a little bit,” he says, looking through Rosa at Maria.

Rosa shakes her head, raising herself up onto her tiptoes and pointing in his face. “Stop ignoring me, you big jerk!” She wants to rest her hands on his shoulders and shake him, just a little.

Maria hums and says, “Maybe a little bit, Guerin.”

Rosa drops back down to her feet and looks over her shoulder to glare at Maria. “You are not helping!”

Maria’s small smile evaporates and she shakes her head, turning around to head into the tent, where a demonstration of this possible alien’s powers is supposed to take place soon.

Rosa lets out a slow breath, ignoring the guilt she feels at the downcast look on Michael’s face as she follows Maria. “It’s for the best,” she murmurs to herself, resisting the urge to look back at him with a shake of her head. 

She stays long enough to watch Arizona’s demonstration, moving close enough to realize the woman’s a fraud. She sighs and looks back at Maria, who looks so damn hopeful, and says, “This is gonna kill her.” She takes a breath. “I can’t watch her find out.”

She decides it’s probably a good time to check in on Alex.

/

He’s in the Project Shepherd bunker, which is not at all a shock, but what is surprising is the fact that Jenna Cameron is there too.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up and says, “What’s going on now?”

She leans between them to see into the folder they’re looking at and sucks in a breath when she sees a photograph of one of Noah’s victims, handprint on full display. “Where’d you get this?” she asks, reaching forward to run her fingers over the tattoo on the girl’s shoulder. She remembers when Manes and Jim found her.

She startles and looks up at the door a minute later when Kyle walks in, saying, “So, you overthrow your father, sent him to Africa, and brought a _girl_ into the clubhouse?”

Cameron squares her shoulders and Rosa snorts. “This should be good,” she murmurs, crossing her arms over her chest and raising a brow at her brother.

Cameron says, “I’m 28 years old, served two tours, and could break 12 bones in your body in less than a second and a half. Who you calling a girl?”

Rosa lets out a slow clap and laughs at the surprised look on her brother’s face.

Alex rolls his eyes and says, ‘“I called you because we are looking into an M.E. named Dr. Jane Holden. She works at your hospital. Do you know her?”

“Her name is familiar,” Kyle says, coming down the steps. “Why do you ask?”

“Holden only signs off on autopsy reports of people who die under strange circumstances,” Cameron says.

Kyle’s eyes flick to Alex at that, who just looks steadily back, and Rosa takes in a deep breath, looking between all of them.

“All 14 of them, said killed by a mysterious handprint,” Cameron finishes.

Kyle shakes his head, eyebrows coming together in confusion. “I’m sorry, did you…14 deaths?”

Cameron nods. “Rosa Ortecho was the first.”

Rosa tilts her head to the side, “Well, first with a handprint. He just broke Kate and Jasmine’s necks.” Her voice shakes, because they are _so close_ to finding out the truth, and she feels like if she had a body, she’d be about to vibrate out of it.

Kyle swallows hard and clenches his jaw, then looks over at Alex again for confirmation. Alex nods and Kyle lets out a shaky breath, looking back to Cameron. “Shouldn’t you be heading home?”

Rosa snorts. “Not your most charming smile, dude. Let’s see how far it gets you though.”

Not very far apparently. “Oh, I’m sorry, to let the guys handle the scary stuff?” Cameron says, looking briefly between Kyle and Alex. When she continues, most of her ire is directed toward Kyle, probably for his comment. “Look, Master Sergeant Manes threatened my sister’s life, okay? If I were smart, I’d stay in line with his order, be quiet, and report just to him. But…” she says, swallowing hard and breaking eye contact. “Someone I work with might be involved.”

Kyle nods, half smirking, half scowling. “Max Evans. Right.”

Alex berates her for holding back on the information for Max, and Cameron brings up the fact that she thinks Max is involved in Isobel’s disappearance. Kyle assures her Isobel’s not missing, and Cameron threatens to go to the sheriff or Manes if they try to push her out of their investigation.

Honestly, it’s exhausting to watch, and that coupled with the tension she can feel all around her from them _almost_ having all of the information is making Rosa anxious. She finally rolls her eyes and says, “She’s not going to let this go. You’re going to have to give her _something_ real.”

Kyle seems to agree. “Just tell her,” he says to Alex.

Alex takes a breath and says, “If what you’re suggesting is true, we aren’t investigating a serial killer. We are investigating an alien serial killer.”

Cameron scoffs, and when Alex doesn’t seem to be joking, she looks back at Kyle and he nods once.

She takes in a shuddery breath and says, “When you say ‘alien’...” She looks between the two of them again, waiting for someone to finish her thought.

Kyle and Alex exchange a look before Kyle sighs and rubs a hand over his face. “We mean it in the traditional sci-fi way, not the ‘build a wall to keep them out’ way.”

Cameron locks eyes with him and shakes her head. “You’re joking, right?”

Rosa sighs and starts pacing around the room, looking at anything interesting they’ve left out. “They’re really, really not.”

Alex rolls his eyes and huffs, gesturing for Cameron to sit down as he says, “Short version? The ‘47 crash was real and our families have been working together for generations to cover that fact up. Long version?”

Cameron sits, eyes wide as she listens to Alex detail the history of Project Shepherd as he knows it thus far. Kyle takes a second to shoot off a text before he puts the phone away to watch Cameron take everything in, frozen in her seat. He locks eyes with Alex as he winds down his explanation, eyebrows lifting in a question.

“You didn’t have to tell her _everything_ ,” Rosa says, watching as Alex digs out the liquor and a glass for Cameron. “As hot as she is and despite the fact that I think she’s a good egg, it still wasn’t your place to tell her that her partner’s awkward, yet endearing moves are literally out of this world.” She sits cross-legged on the table in front of Cameron, leaning back on her hands to watch them all.

Cameron says, “You know, I knew something weird was going on, but “Max Evans is an alien murderer” wasn’t top of my list.”

Alex sets the glass and liquor down in front of her and says, “Just out of curiosity, what was?”

She shrugs. “I don’t know. Wizard murderer?” she says, throwing back her drink.

Rosa snorts and shakes her head as Kyle says, “Max isn’t any kind of murderer. I mean, probably. I don’t know.”

“You know he’s not,” Rosa says.

“No, he’s not,” Alex says, and Rosa throws her arm toward him, raising her eyebrows like, _See?_ “My dad is a bigot with no moral compass. Nothing he says about anyone should be taken as truth.”

Kyle rolls his eyes and says, “Is everyone in this town in love with Max Evans?”

Rosa pouts over at him and says, “Aww, is someone feeling a little neglected?”

“Angsty nerd isn’t really my type,” Alex shoots back. “Even if he is tall.”

Rosa cackles and leans forward to run her hand over Alex’s hair.

Kyle tilts his head to the side and asks him, “Is your type angry cowboy?”

Rosa splutters out a laugh at the death glare Alex shoots at Kyle and says to her brother, “You better run, dude. If anyone could kill with a look, it’d be Alex Manes.”

She turns back to Alex as he starts denying the fact that Michael’s the reason he shut down Project Shepherd, but it’s clear Kyle doesn’t believe him. Even a dead woman can tell he’s not being truthful. Rosa lets out a frustrated groan and shakes her head at him. “If you still care about him, then why’d you say that shit to him last night? Why’d you push him away like that? He’s trying to _move on_ as we speak because _you_ told him, in no uncertain terms, that it was over between the two of you, when it’s clear from your goddamn puppy dog eyes right now it’s not!”

She lays down on the table and looks up at the ceiling. “Why are the two of you such goddamn disasters at actually _talking_ to each other like civilized human beings?”

/

When Rosa arrives back in Texas, she’s in a bar, where Liz and Maria are sitting at a table talking shit about Arizona, while Max stands nearby sneaking not-so-covert glances at Liz. Rosa slides into Max’s empty seat just as Michael walks up with a bunch of drinks, saying, “Dinner is served!”

Maria eyes them and says, “Did you even pay for these?” as she takes one.

Michael smirks. “I may have come into some money recently.” Max rolls his eyes and Michael shrugs, saying, “It’s not my fault the swindler left buckets of cash unattended!”

Liz holds her glass up to him, eyes narrowed, and nods. “ _Salud_ ,” she toasts, and he and Maria echo the sentiment.

Rosa tilts her head back to see if Max is going to take up his drink for the toast, but he says he’s tired and leaves to get water. Rosa turns back to the table with a sigh and says, “I hate mopey Max, he’s such a downer. And considering you’re a few pertinent discoveries and a couple short whole-group conversations away from everyone _finally_ figuring out Isobel is _not_ my murderer, I’m not down for that tonight.”

Maria seems to feel much the same. “Turns out my mom is gonna lose all her memories by the time she’s 50, Arizona’s a thief, I’ve been stuck with Guerin all day, and Max is moping? No. Absolutely not.” She gets up and heads for the stage.

Michael turns back to Liz and says, voice concerned, “You gonna follow her?”

“Nope,” Liz says.

“It’s funny how you think she needs anyone,” Rosa adds, just as Michael asks if Maria needs a girlfriend for support.

“Nope,” Liz asserts again.

They all turn to the stage when Maria picks up the microphone and takes over the stage for an impromptu open mic night. The first bars of _You Learn_ start, and Rosa cheers up at her on the stage, howling as loud as she can because no one’s going to stop her, and Maria looks like she needs it after today.

Max comes back over with his water, that old man, and takes Maria’s chair. Liz leans forward and says, “Hey.” He looks over, a small smile gracing his face. “You wanna dance?” she asks him.

Rosa’s chest feels tight, because Liz’s face is open and hopeful, and it feels like it could be the moment these two crazy kids finally get their shit together.

Tragically, Max declines, to which Rosa loudly boos him and Liz shrugs, saying, “Your loss.”

“His loss indeed!” Rosa agrees, sticking her tongue out at him.

Liz has already moved on though, standing up and gripping Michael’s shoulders to pull him up and over to the dance floor with her. “Come on, dance with me, Mikey,” she says.

Rosa jumps up and follows them, laughing. “Hey, only I’m allowed to call him Mikey, and that’s because he can’t actually tell me not to!”

But he allows it from Liz, and he also allows her to drag him to the dance floor, where they all sing along with Maria and show off their (really tragic, in Michael’s case) dance moves. Maria is a born performer, playing it up for the crowd, and as she sings and wanders the room, she and Michael exchange a few flirtatious looks and touches.

Rosa has to stop dancing with Liz for a second to track her eyes over them before she releases a heavy sigh and says, “Fuck. Why was I cursed to watch my friends all ruin their relationships and be unable to do anything but watch it happen?” She watches as Maria hands the microphone back over to the band with a smile and nod of thanks before she heads over to the bar, Michael trailing her. “Is this what Cassandra felt like her whole life?” she asks.

Liz has fun dancing with some locals while the band continues with their set while Max watches her from afar. Rosa sits down at the table with him and sighs. “Just go dance with her, you big dope. I know you can. I saw you at Isobel’s wedding.”

Of course he doesn’t, just continues to watch her drink and dance with Maria and Michael and every other person in the bar except for himself throughout the course of the night.

“Definitely a Cassandra,” Rosa says with a sigh, chin resting in her hand.

A while later, Maria drifts over to tell Max she’s heading out for some air.

He stands up automatically and says, “You want me to go with you?”

Maria, glassy-eyed and red-faced shakes her head. “Nah, I’ve already got a shadow I can’t quite shake,” she says, glancing over at Michael, who’s getting another shot at the bar and sneaking glances at Maria. She looks back at Max and leans in, lowering her voice so Max has to lean in too. “Besides, it’s the kind of fresh air I don’t want the cops catching wind of.” Rosa snorts at her inelegant turn of phrase.

Max rolls his eyes, suppressing a smile at her exaggerated wink, and nods. “If you’re sure?”

She shrugs and says, “As long as one of you comes out I’ll be fine, and I’m betting it will be Guerin. Even drunk that man can hold his own.”

Rosa sighs and says, “Unfortunately, I know this to be true.” Max nods in agreement and they both watch her walk out, making sure Michael follows a moment later. Max makes his way up to the bar again to make sure their tab has been paid. “You are such a goody-goody,” Rosa murmurs.

Liz sidles up to his other side and says, “Did we lose our people?”

Max explains where the other two are and offers her a ride home.

Rosa and Liz shake their head and Liz says, “No, it’s a long drive, and you look exhausted.”

Rosa nods in agreement with her and says, “Sleeping and spending all of your time in a cave will do that to you.”

Max admits that he’s having trouble sleeping while Isobel’s in the pod. “I know it’s weird,” he says.

Liz shakes her head and says softly, “It’s not so weird.”

“It’s weird,” Max says again.

Rosa sighs and runs a hand down his back while Liz tilts her head to the side, looking him over. “Okay, well,” Liz says. “You’re too tired to drive, and I’m currently made of tequila, so, there’s a motel across the street. We can get a couple rooms, text Michael and Maria where we’re at.”

Max agrees and they head over to the motel.

/

Rosa nearly loses her mind when the kid at the front desk tells Max and Liz there’s only one room left, turning to them with wide eyes, unable to suppress her wide grin. “Guys. This is it. The universe is practically giving you permission to hook up on a silver platter.”

The two of them are arguing about their options, saying that he could sleep in the truck (Max) and that no, they’re adults who can totally handle sharing a bed, ndb (Liz). It’s adorable, truly, but she sees how badly they both want to sleep, even in the most innocent sense of the word, with each other.

Rosa about murders the punk at the desk when he says he’s found another available room.

When she and Liz get up to their room, Liz texts Maria the room number then lays out on the bed in the jalapeño room, tossing and turning under her blanket. Rosa lies next to her. “I know you’re worried about the cure,” she whispers, scooting just a little bit closer to her sister. “But you’ll figure it out soon. I know it.”

Liz huffs out a breath and turns over again, grumbling about the itchy blanket. Rosa tucks her hair behind her ear and licks her lips. “In the meantime,” she says, louder. “I’m going to need you to do a couple things for me. First, make out with the dopey alien, would you? The entire world knows you want to.” Liz shifts again and Rosa instinctively leans away from her flailing limbs, rolling her eyes as she has a vivid flashback to sharing a bed with Liz when they were kids. “Second, please tune in to this thing that’s happening with Michael and Maria and talk to one of them about it.” She sighs. “Preferably Michael, because he has the context you need in order to help him really think through what he’s doing, and he’ll crack like an egg under your investigative prowess.”

Finally, Liz throws off her blanket and gets out of bed, pulling her pants on again and heading for the door. Rosa pops up, bouncing on the edge of the bed a couple of times before she follows. “Are you going to follow through with request one?” she asks eagerly, walking along at Liz’s side down the hallway. Instead of heading to Max’s room though, Liz leads them outside.

Rosa scowls, but brightens again when she sees Max out on the swings in the courtyard. Liz heads over to him and Rosa says, “Third time’s a charm?”

She takes a seat on a nearby bench while Liz takes the swing next to Max’s and says, “I’m sorry you didn’t get what you came here for.”

Max shrugs and says, “Shouldn’t have let myself become a hoping kind of person. I don’t know, I just keep thinking that I wish there was someone out there who could relate.”

Rosa swallows and tilts her head at Max. “I mean, Michael’s here…”

Liz seems to be thinking along the same lines because she says, “I know you miss Isobel, but you still have Michael.” Rosa smiles over at her sister when she continues with, “Don’t tell him, but I actually kind of like him.”

“Hell yeah, you do,” Rosa says, scrunching her nose. “Even though he makes stupid decisions in his romantic life, at least you know you can count on him to be a good friend. And lab partner, apparently.”

Max talks about the guilt he feels having his power and not using it to help people, but Liz reassures him he doesn’t need to feel that guilt.

“I agree,” Rosa says, nodding. “It wouldn’t be fair to put saving every injured person on you.”

“Not saving someone isn’t the same as killing them,” Liz says, echoing Kyle’s words.

Rosa’s lips quirk. “My brother is so smart.”

“Do you really believe that?” Max asks, tone skeptical.

“I’m trying to,” Liz admits.

“The problem with having a superpower, right?” he asks.

“Yeah,” Liz agrees, pushing her swing around a little. “Uneasy lies the head that wears the crown.”

Max’s face lights up as he looks over at her and says, “Henry IV.”

Liz’s lips quirk. “Part II.”

Their eyes lock, fond and warm, and Rosa holds her breath. They look away and Rosa lets out curse in Spanish under her breath, but then Max stands up, offering his coat to Liz. “Oh my god, kiss her, you great idiot!” she yells up at him, but he doesn’t. Just slips his coat around Liz’s shoulders and steps back, a perfect gentleman. Rosa scowls over at him.

He thanks Liz again for helping with Isobel’s cure even though they don’t deserve it, and Liz waves him off, stating she can’t blame him for protecting his sister under the circumstances.

He looks down at her, shoulders hunched. “I let you believe for ten years…”

She shakes her head and says, “Yes, but I’m not angry at you for that.”

Rosa stands up and moves to sit on Max’s abandoned swing. “Then what are you angry at him for?” she asks, brow furrowed. “Why won’t you let him in?”

Liz sighs and stands up. “I don’t trust people, Max. I-I...I don’t think people are inherently good.”

Rosa sighs and stands up too. “But some people _are_ ,” she says. “Some people _stay_ , and some people truly care about others, and some people _try_ , so, so hard to be good, and that has to count for something.” Her eyes are full of tears, blurring Liz’s figure.

“But I believed you were,” Liz continues, looking up at Max. “So when you lied to me, it broke my heart. I was angry at _myself_ for letting that happen.”

Rosa wipes at her eyes and groans. “God, I will never _not_ regret telling you about that cage around your heart. You keep using it as an excuse to push people away, and I hate it.”

Max swallows and shakes his head. “It’s not your fault that I let you down,” he says quietly.

“But that’s the thing,” Liz says with a small smile. “I still believe you’re good.”

Rosa lets out a shaky breath and says, “Good.” And she’s so relieved Liz isn’t completely closing herself off from Max that she doesn’t even yell at her for leaving him alone on the swings again.

They get back to their room and Liz pulls out her phone. “Where the hell is Maria?” she murmurs to herself as she undresses again.

Rosa rolls her eyes and says, “Hopefully on her way back here with Michael. I’ll kill him if I find her passed out in the cab of her truck. She learned the lesson about not sleeping there at least five years ago.”

She takes a deep breath and focuses her thoughts on Maria, surprised when she feels the pull to her and ends up standing out in the middle of the desert. She cocks her head, confused, and turns around to see Maria and Michael going at it on the ground nearby.

Rosa squeaks and spins away from them, covering her eyes. “Oh my god, you two!” There are loud grunts and moans and...other unpleasant sounds that make her squeal again and move her hands over her ears. “Oh my _god_!”

She stomps her foot and groans before yelling over her shoulder, “You’re going to get sand in so many unpleasant places!” and taking off away from them at a run. Once she feels she’s run far enough away that she won’t hear anything else that will traumatize her for death, she pulls her hands away from her ears and places them on her hips. She looks up at the sky and breathes out, “Fucking Cassandra,” before dropping her chin to her chest and breathing deep. “This is going to kill Alex.”

/

Max confronts Arizona about the alien symbol the next morning, not for the first time, Rosa gathers. The lady with her tells Max it’s a family secret, and that intrigues Rosa. The woman goes on to talk about a woman on her reservation two decades ago who could heal people with her hands, and Rosa can see the hope rise in Max’s eyes. She also sees the profound disappointment in them when he finds out she died.

He meets Liz at Michael’s truck, where she’s looking down at her phone. He sighs deeply and leans on the door next to her.

“Nothing?” she asks, nose scrunching in sympathy.

He shakes his head, not wanting to talk about it, and nods down at her phone. “You find our people?”

Liz’s lips quirk and she rolls her eyes. “Maria’s not answering, but Michael’s up. Apparently they got lost in the desert last night and slept in a _ditch_ a hundred feet from the bar parking lot?” She nods at Max’s raised eyebrows. “I know. He says we can take off, and he’ll get a ride with Maria.”

Rosa groans and decides she’ll avoid those two for a while, for fear of walking in on something else she doesn’t want to see.

The ride back with Max and Liz starts quiet, but it’s comfortable. Max broods for about half an hour before Liz coaxes him into a conversation that lasts the rest of the drive. Rosa lays on the back seat and closes her eyes, calmed by the quiet sound of their conversation.

When they get back to Roswell, they head straight to the cave to check in on Isobel and Max tells Liz about what he’d learned about the symbol.

“There was an alien like me on her reservation,” he tells her, pacing around Isobel’s pod.

“Was?” Liz asks, tilting her head as she watches him.

He nods. “Apparently she was a healer, and that symbol just…” He huffs and shrugs. “Showed up around her all the time. Has to mean she was one of us, right?”

“If I had to guess?” Liz nods.

Rosa shrugs and says, “I mean, I’d hope more of you made it out of the crash before the military swooped in.”

Max sighs and presses his hand to Isobel’s pod. “Any information about our home died with that woman on the reservation.”

Rosa takes a deep breath and shakes her head. “No, it didn’t. There are a ton of people still imprisoned at Caulfield, and it’s only a matter of time before Alex finds them.” She rolls her eyes and goes on to mutter, “Plus your own brother-in-law. You’re not as alone as you think.”

Liz finds out Max has been sleeping in Isobel’s cave most nights, and panic lights her eyes. She starts breathing heavily and makes her way out of the cave. Rosa follows. “Liz,” she says, reaching out for her.

Max follows, and when they walk out into the late morning light, he asks, “You alright?”

Liz continues walking, hands shaking at her sides. “No. I’m terrified I’m gonna inadvertently kill your sister and you’re gonna hate me.”

Rosa shakes her head. “You won’t, and he’s never gonna hate you. He loves you.”

Max catches up to them and Rosa moves out of his way. “You’re not gonna kill her, okay? I trust you,” he says, and Liz lets out a disbelieving breath. “I know you would never roll the dice on her life like that.” They stop and turn to face each other and he finishes, shaking his head, “And I could never hate you.”

“Told ya,” Rosa murmurs, half a smile on her face.

“Never?” Liz asks, and her voice is high in her panic. “That’s the problem, Max. I don’t know what to do with the way you feel about me.”

Max rears back a little, cocking his head at her. Rosa rolls her eyes and says, “Here we go.”

“For ten years, you have loved a version of me that doesn’t exist anymore. This smart, perfect girl who believes in God and-and love and humanity. I am different now.” She takes a breath, locking eyes with him to make sure he’s paying attention, and he nods. She continues, “I’m a mess. I run away from everything.”

Rosa sighs and shakes her head. “You’re not that different, at the heart of things.”

Max disagrees too. “And you’re overly defensive,” he jumps in, stopping Liz in her tracks. “And you’re sometimes selfish, and you’re always muttering in Spanish like you think it’s some secret language that no one understands but you.” He smiles and throws his arms out wide. “Hello, we’re in New Mexico. We all speak Spanish.”

Rosa huffs out a laugh and steps closer, watching Liz’s face while Max details her faults in the most romantic way possible. His tone changes as he steps closer to Liz, solemn and sincere. “You always have to convince everyone you’re the smartest person in the room, like we don’t already know,” he says, taking her hands. Liz’s mouth drops open, bobbing up and down like she’s struggling to come up with a reply, and Rosa holds her breath. Max continues, “You think your sister was hard to love.” Liz’s eyes lock on his while he says, “And so you think by being perfect and being the smartest, that you’re easier to love. Easier for your mom, easier for your dad.”

Rosa steps away from them, pressing her fingers to her lips because the awestruck look in Liz’s eyes tells her this is going somewhere amazing, and she doesn’t want to ruin it.

“But you’re not perfect,” Max says with a small smile, shaking his head. “I see your faults. And I love you.” His voice softens. “Easily. You believe in the good in me when I can’t see it. So is it crazy that I believe in you, too? Without evidence, I just...know.”

Max pulls away, and Rosa makes a noise of protest, holding her hands out to block his way, shaking her head. “Come on, I’ll drive you home,” he says to Liz.

Liz grabs his arm and pulls him back to her, leaning up as she pulls his head down for a kiss. Rosa chokes out a laugh and spins around, squealing and covering her face. “Finally!”

/

Max drops them off at home, and he and Liz have the biggest grins on their faces, it’s disgusting. Rosa rolls her eyes but also has to suppress her smile. “At least this couple won’t cause problems in the friend group,” she murmurs as she waits for Liz so they can go to the hospital. Liz practically floats down the stairs into the diner.

Their dad, eating his lunch at the counter, raises his eyebrows and says, “I didn’t hear you come home last night, _mija_.”

Liz hums as she plucks a piece of bacon from his plate. “I went to McLean with Maria, looking into something to help Mimi.”

“And that’s what’s got you so happy right now?” he says skeptically.

Liz shakes her head and smiles. “I kissed Max.”

Their dad’s eyes light up and he visibly works to suppress his smile. Rosa just laughs and stands behind him, placing her chin on his shoulder. “I know, right?” she whispers into his ear.

“Should I get out the ingredients for churro pancakes?” he asks, voice quivering as he tries to remain calm. 

Liz picks up a second piece of bacon and points it at him. “First, I can’t right now because I’m in the middle of a project at the hospital. I’m heading out now to go check on it. Second,” she waves the bacon in his face then shoves it into her mouth. “This doesn’t taste like turkey bacon,” she says accusingly as she chews.

He shrugs innocently and says, “Tomorrow morning, then?”

Liz narrows her eyes on him, but he keeps blinking up at her, refusing to answer to her accusation. “Fine,” she says, nodding. “But we’re gonna have a talk about this at the same time,” she promises as she heads for the door.

Their dad sighs, looking down at his plate sadly. “You’ve been doing good, _Papi_ , but you agreed, no real bacon,” Rosa says, brushing her lips over his cheek before she leaves to follow Liz.

/

Kyle’s in the lab when they get there, and Rosa holds her breath when he says he wanted to check on the serum. She lets it all out and tears spring to her eyes when he says it’s working.

“But I don’t think you should free Isobel quite yet,” he tells Liz. “She might be more dangerous than we think.”

He tells her about all the handprint-related deaths over the course of the last ten years, covered up by Project Shepherd.

Rosa paces around them as he tells her what he knows, watching Liz’s face run the course from confusion to horror to fear and back to confusion. “But that doesn’t make sense,” she says, shaking her head. “Isobel hasn’t had any blackouts in ten years.”

“Are you sure about that?” Kyle asks, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s not like Max or Guerin have been with her 24/7 for the last decade.”

Liz licks her lips and sighs. “They would have noticed if something was off with her again. They knew the signs of her dissociation, and it hasn’t happened since the night Rosa died.” She leans back against the counter and presses her fingers to her temple, shrugging. “But 14 deaths? That doesn’t make sense. Unless…”

“Unless?” Kyle asks, eyes locked on hers.

“Unless there’s another alien,” Rosa whispers. “Come on, you’re so close.”

Liz shakes her head and says, “I have an idea, but I need to talk to Max first.”

Kyle rolls his eyes but nods. “You’ll let me know what’s up?” he asks.

She nods and says, “Of course.” She steps forward to press a kiss to his cheek. “See you later?”

Kyle nods again and leaves. Liz pulls on her lab coat and starts checking over her samples again.

/

Liz is taking forever triple checking her results like the overcautious science nerd she is, so Rosa leaves her to check in on whatever had Kyle at the hospital on a Sunday. Except he’s not at the hospital, he’s at the police station, following Cameron into an office, eyeing the blinds on the windows closely.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up. “Is this you making a move on the hot deputy?”

“What’ve you got, Valenti?” Cameron asks, crossing her arms over her chest.

Kyle holds out a folder to her, and Rosa steps closer when she realizes he’s truly agitated. “What’s going on?” she asks, hand hovering over his arm.

“I was trying to remember where I knew Dr. Holden’s name from,” he tells Cameron as she starts flipping through the file. “Then it occurred to me. My father,” he says.

Rosa drifts over beside Cameron, looking down at the file. “What?” she asks.

“Holden signed his death records,” Cameron says.

Rosa’s head snaps up and she looks to her brother. “You’ve figured out it wasn’t a natural death.”

“Which means he didn’t die of a brain tumor,” he says. “Whatever killed him… whoever killed him.” He takes a breath. “Master Sergeant Jesse Manes covered it up.”

Cameron holds eye contact with him as she closes the file. “Why would he do that?”

“Because he’s the one that killed him,” Rosa says quietly.

Kyle shrugs. “I don’t know, but I want to find out.”

Rosa runs her hand down his arm and nods. “Once Alex tracks down Caulfield, you’ll be able to find your answers.” She lets out a slow breath and says quietly, “God, you guys have almost got all the pieces now.” She only hopes all of them can bring all the pieces together and find the right way to make them fit.


	10. I Don't Want to Miss a Thing

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You want to wait for Michael?” Liz asks.
> 
> Max shakes his head. “I tried calling him, but he’s not answering. I left a message, so he might show up, but I just…” he sighs, placing a hand on Isobel’s pod. “I can’t wait any longer, not if you have the cure right here, ready to go.”
> 
> “But what if she doesn’t remember you?” Rosa asks. “You’ll need his help convincing her to trust you, and to take the cure.” She shakes her head. “I think you should wait for Michael.”
> 
> They don’t seem to think that will be an issue, because Max drapes a blanket over one arm and dips the opposite hand into the liquid silver mixture. Rosa stands by, hand hovering over the pod as Max reaches in and pulls Isobel out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next two chapters are nearly ready, and I'm writing the finale this weekend, hopefully. It's almost all done, y'all!
> 
> Episode dialogue obtained from transcripts.foreverdreaming.org.
> 
> Thanks as always to insidiousintent for the beta and validation over some turns of phrase that I was particularly proud of...

When Rosa catches up with Liz, she’s back at the cave with Max, and they’re preparing a silver mixture to pull Isobel from her pod.

“You want to wait for Michael?” Liz asks.

Max shakes his head. “I tried calling him, but he’s not answering. I left a message, so he might show up, but I just…” he sighs, placing a hand on Isobel’s pod. “I can’t wait any longer, not if you have the cure right here, ready to go.”

“But what if she doesn’t remember you?” Rosa asks. “You’ll need his help convincing her to trust you, and to take the cure.” She shakes her head. “I think you should wait for Michael.”

They don’t seem to think that will be an issue, because Max drapes a blanket over one arm and dips the opposite hand into the liquid silver mixture. Rosa stands by, hand hovering over the pod as Max reaches in and pulls Isobel out.

He wraps the blanket around her, holding her tight to him while she gasps and finds her footing. “Okay, hey. It’s okay, it’s okay,” he says soothingly.

Rosa steps to her side as Max turns her to face him, hand hovering over Isobel’s back. “Isobel?” she asks, searching her eyes. They’re wide and scared and wild. Rosa presses her lips together.

“Alright?” Max asks, looking down at Isobel. “Do you remember anything?”

Isobel inhales sharply, eyes searching his, still wide, and Rosa has a sinking feeling in her chest. “Oh, no.”

“Hey, it’s just me, okay?” Max says to her, smiling and cupping her face. “It’s just me. Do you remember me?”

Isobel’s eyes clear and she says, “Max,” pulling him into a hug. Rosa hears him let out a relieved sigh as he buries his face in her shoulder, and Rosa smiles, exhaling slowly.

When they finally pull apart, Isobel turns to Liz and asks, “Did you find a cure?”

Liz fiddles with the syringe as she walks over to Isobel. “We’re about to find out,” she says, and she injects her with the cure.

Rosa drops into Max’s abandoned chair with a sigh, propping her elbows on her knees as she watches them prepare to go to Max’s so Liz can check Isobel’s blood to make sure the cure is working.

She watches a few minutes later when Max bundles Isobel into the passenger seat of his jeep and nods over to Liz before they leave. Liz sits in her car for a minute before she leaves, looking down at her steering wheel and breathing deep.

“You okay?” Rosa whispers, leaning over the center console to rest her hand over her sister’s wrist.

Liz closes her eyes and takes another deep breath, gripping the steering wheel tightly before she exhales slowly. Then she nods, puts her car into reverse, and starts the drive to Max’s. 

Rosa sighs and turns to look out the front window. “I know this was hard for you.” She turns back to see Liz staring determinedly out at the desert, lips pressed together. “Thank you, though. Hopefully you’ll figure out the fourth alien is the one who killed me soon, and then you won’t have to feel guilty about saving Isobel.”

When they get back to Max’s, Liz smiles tightly at Isobel before she takes a sample of her blood, then Isobel leaves to take a quick shower. Liz sets up her to-go lab kit on Max’s kitchen counter while he makes her a cup of coffee. Rosa sits on the stool next to Liz and watches Max watch her. There’s excitement and longing in his eyes, but there’s also a very real fear. It’s this fear, Rosa guesses, that has him opening his mouth to say something to Liz and then closing it again before he actually says anything.

When Isobel comes out of the bathroom, clad in a tank top and jeans, Max seems to struggle with what he should do. Finally, he sighs and walks over to hug Isobel again, reaching over to grab a sweatshirt for her from the side of the couch. They sit down on the couch and chat while Liz checks over Isobel’s blood sample.

Rosa watches her sister as she checks over the same slide four times, letting out a relieved sigh before she turns to Isobel and says, “Okay. Looks like all normal activity has returned to your mitochondrial DNA.”

Max shifts to face her and says, “And the bad news?”

Liz stands up and tilts her head. “Drugs have side-effects.”

Rosa snorts and lets out a long groan. “Yeah.”

“I mean, this is bathtub gin, and anything can happen,” Liz says, starting to pack up her kit. “Kyle is going to examine you when he can, but everything seems stable. She’s an alien again.”

Rosa lifts a brow and eyes her sister. “You actually seem pretty happy about that.”

“I’ll give you two some time,” Liz says to them.

Max stands and reaches out for her hands, thanking her. Rosa watches Isobel watch them, and her eyebrows are raised, lips twitching. Rosa rolls her eyes, because she knows as soon as Liz leaves…

“Thank you, Liz,” Isobel mimics him, her voice low and smooth. “For everything.” Max smiles and shrugs over at her as she continues to mock him. “For your gentle caress, for drowning me in the sweet chocolate depth of your eyes, for your lingering scent of desert rose…”

Max nods and picks up a pillow from his couch, whacking her with it once as she laughs. “Whoa, what? Come on!” She smiles genuinely and says to him, “I forgot what it’s like to see you happy.”

Max smiles at her and Rosa shakes her head. “I don’t know if I’ve ever seen him this happy.”

Max shakes his head at Isobel and leaves to say goodbye to Liz, and then it hits Rosa. “Where the hell is Michael?” she wonders aloud. “He should have at least called by now.”

Isobel seems to be thinking the same thing, because she’s pulling out her phone to call him but she only gets his voicemail. “Hey, it’s your sister!” she says cheerfully. “You know, the one who’s been in  _ rehab _ for the last month and a half!” Rosa rolls her eyes and Isobel continues, voice rife with a little more forced cheer. “I’m back, and you’re not here, so I have to assume the worst. Whoever they are, they better be worth the shit I’m going to be giving you later for this.” She lets out a slow breath and her smile drops. “Also, I’m heading home after this, to see Noah, and I’m gonna tell him...everything. It’s time.” She nods once and ends her message with a quiet, “Call me.”

Rosa crosses her arms over her chest and shakes her head. “Good luck with that,” she says, scowling. “In the meantime, I’m going to go track down Michael.” She presses her fingers over her eyes and says, “God, I hope he’s not having sex with Maria again.”

/

It’s bright, wherever she appears, but that means jack shit because the last time she’d seen Michael he’d had no qualms about public indecency laws. However, it’s also quiet, so she huffs out a breath as she slowly uncovers her eyes to find out where they are.

She chokes on nothing when she sees Michael and Alex sitting across Michael’s fire pit from each other. “What’s going on?” she asks, sliding into the seat between them as she eyes them both.

Alex’s hands are on his knees, clenching and unclenching rhythmically as he inhales and exhales slowly, eyes fixed on Michael. Michael’s posture is loose, but she can see his shoulders are tense, and he holds Alex’s gaze for a long time before he looks away.

“You okay?” he asks, breaking the silence between them. He looks back at Alex, a small smile quirking his lips, and says, “I can erase your mind if you regret what you know now.”

Rosa’s gaze snaps over to Alex before back to Michael. “You told him? Or did he tell you?”

“What? You can do that?” Alex asks.

Michael rolls his eyes and says, “No, but that would be pretty cool!”

Rosa groans and says, “Oh my god, Guerin.” The look on Alex’s face says he’s thinking the same thing.

“Look, ask whatever you want,” Michael tells him, and he sounds so earnest Rosa has to sigh.

He’s finally ready to be open about his alien-ness to Alex, so when Alex asks why Max and Isobel were adopted separately from him after they were found, Michael comes back with a quip about hatching out of a pod. 

Alex shakes his head at Michael’s deflection, saying, “Look, I’ve known about alien stuff for months. I want to know about  _ you _ .”

Rosa’s brow furrows as she studies him while Michael does the same. Rosa hums and says, “Why are you asking this now?” She watches the way his eyes follow Michael’s every movement as he tells him about his childhood. “Why, after what you said to him the other night?”

It’s a stupid question, she knows. She’s been friends with Alex for more than twenty years, and she’s watched the relationship between Michael and Alex falter and stumble, simmer and burn for a lot of the last ten. She knows Alex does nothing without thinking it through first, a holdover from all the years living with his father that he’s perfected in the last ten years in the military. She also knows the only person he’s unable to think clearly around is Michael.

“The other night was just a reflex, wasn’t it?” she murmurs. “You lashed out because you didn’t know what else to do.” She sighs, watching him swallow hard as he hears about Michael’s time in the foster system. “Oh, honey.” She looks at the way they look at each other, like they’re the only thing that matters in the world, and she stands up and screams. “Why do you both have to be so terrible at communicating?” she yells, pacing around them. “Why can’t you,” she says, pointing at Alex, “ever just say what you feel? And you!” she turns, glaring at Michael. “Why do you always have to deflect and hide and-and-and  _ sleep  _ with people you have no business sleeping with, considering who their best friends are?”

Also dumb questions, but she can only stare at a train wreck for so long before she gets frustrated about not being able to do anything to save anyone. She sits back down and crosses her arms over her chest with a huff. “If you dumbasses had had this conversation  _ two days ago _ , this asshole might not have done something that’s definitely going to fuck up several relationships all at once, and end up hurting multiple someones who don’t deserve it,” she grumbles, glaring over at Michael.

He finishes telling Alex about his experiences growing up and lets out a shaky exhale. On the next inhale he says, “I showed you mine, now you show me yours.” Rosa scowls at his smirk and he continues, “How’d you know about me?”

Alex takes a breath, and face stoic, says, “Massive government conspiracy.”

Michael laughs and shakes his head. Rosa sighs and looks over at him. “He’s not joking,” she says.

Alex raises an eyebrow ton convey the same thing, and Michael’s smile drops. “What?” he says, hands gripping the armrests on his chair, thighs tensing like he’s about to leap up. His eyes dart around the junkyard.

Rosa leans toward him, her scowl softening. “Michael, it’s okay.”

Alex leans forward and licks his lips, hand outstretched. “Guerin.” Michael’s eyes lock on Alex’s, shoulders tense and chest heaving. “You’re okay. No one’s going to hurt you,” Alex promises, breathing slowly as he keeps eye contact with Michael, and it seems to calm Michael down, because his breathing starts matching up with Alex’s. “Do you need me to tell you about it?” Alex asks him after his posture loosens up and his eyes become less manic.

Michael sucks in a rough breath and nods jerkily. Alex nods in return and sits back in his chair, giving Michael a basic overview of Project Shepherd’s origins and his father’s continued involvement in the project even after it was shut down.

Michael seems to relax more when he learns Alex has kicked Manes off the project and sent him to Africa. When Alex is done, Michael takes a few quiet minutes to absorb the information before he looks back to Alex. “Do you know if he has any artifacts, as part of the project?”

Alex’s eyebrows come together and he tilts his head. “What do you mean?”

Michael sighs and considers him for a long time before he stands up. “I’ll show you.”

Rosa’s eyes widen as she stands up next to him, watching Alex follow Michael’s lead over to the Airstream. Michael reaches his hand out, brow furrowing as he concentrates on pushing it back to clear the entrance to his bunker. She turns when she hears Alex’s breath hitch, sees his eyes widen as he watches Michael move the trailer with his mind. 

Alex presses his lips together and swallows hard, eyes still fixed on Michael, and Rosa has to smother her laugh. “Oh, honey,” she says, shaking her head as she drops down into the bunker.

When he gets to the bottom, Alex starts wandering immediately, eyes jumping from artifact to schematic to Michael’s stockpile of nail polish remover in the corner. Michael’s eyes follow Alex. He waits for him to take some of it in before he says, “So, this is my big secret.”

Alex’s gaze travels over the blueprints for the ship Michael’s rebuilding and says, “You’re building something?”

Rosa boosts herself up onto the central table so she can watch the two of them. “He’s been working on this for as long as I’ve been stalking him,” she says, legs swinging. “And I think from a lot longer before that.”

“Uh...trying to,” Michael says. “It’s like trying to bring a T. rex back to life with a couple scraps of bone.”

Alex’s eyes narrow on him and he asks, “Why are you showing me this, Guerin? I just told you that my family’s been targeting yours for generations.”

Rosa sighs and lays back on the table between them, head resting in her hands as she stares up at the ceiling. “Now who’s asking dumb questions?”

Michael’s lips quirk in a pained smile. “I’ve been sick of secrets for a long time now,” he says. “And if anyone’s gonna destroy me...might as well be you.”

Rosa sits up and says, “Jesus, Guerin!” She’d been hoping for some more open communication between them, for a lot of reasons, but that was too open. He might as well have flayed himself open and given Alex some acid to pour onto the wounds.

He turns away from her and Alex and says, “No one’s ever seen this before.” He pulls the tarp off of his ship, and Rosa shakes her head, because it’s another wound he’s exposing to Alex. “I’m pretty sure it’s a console,” he says as Alex steps closer, eyes fixated on the shimmering glass. “The ship’s central control panel. I think it’s the key to everything. I think it’s my only way out.”

Rosa jumps off the table to stand on Alex’s other side, watching him as he studies the ship. His brow is furrowed and there’s a barely noticeable hitch in his breath. “Alex?” she asks, reaching out to place her hand just over his shoulder.

He has to clear his throat before he can say, “You built this thing?”

Michael shrugs. “Sort of. It kind of builds itself. Pieces want to be together.”

Alex shakes his head. “What do you mean, they  _ want _ to be?”

Michael bites his lip and points to the small pieces of glass sitting next to the console. Alex moves out of the way as Michael picks one up and says, “When they fit, the molecules knit together on contact. It’s like it was never broken at all.” They watch as he moves the piece into place with his mind, then as it connects to the rest of the console, repairing itself as if it were never broken at all. “If I can find the rest, I can attach this to a vehicle and--”

“A vehicle?” Alex interrupts. “You’re trying to leave. The planet.”

Rosa holds her breath, hand hovering over his shoulder as she searches his face. “Alex…” she says, shaking her head as she watches him process. He takes a deep breath, and she says, “No, don’t--”

But he’s already turning away from Michael, saying, “I, uh...I think I need a little time to process all of this.”

Rosa turns back to Michael, hoping he’ll step closer, make Alex stay so he can explain, but he’s nodding in acknowledgement, not even looking at Alex anymore. Alex makes a bullshit excuse about not wanting to get snowed in at Sanders’ and promises to talk to Michael later. Michael doesn’t say anything, just watches him leave, and Rosa follows Alex up.

She slides into the passenger seat as he gets into his car, saying, “Why didn’t you stay? Why won’t you  _ talk to him _ about what you’re feeling?” He reaches for the bag she’s sitting on and she scowls, ready to lay into him some more, but she freezes when he pulls out a large piece of the alien glass. Her eyes fly up to his, but he’s staring down at it, running his fingers over the shimmering symbols. “Where did you get that?” she whispers, eyes wide on his.

He takes a minute to breathe quiet, controlled breaths, all while shifting his attention between the glass and Michael’s Airstream.

“Why didn’t you tell him you have a piece of it, Alex?” she asks, voice quiet. She shakes her head and sighs, leaning back on the headrest. “Because you don’t want him to leave, and if you hold on to that, you know he can’t,” she answers for him. She watches as he places the glass back into his backpack. “It’s not fair, though. You can’t let him…flay himself open like that and give nothing back. You can’t…” she sighs, gesturing down to the bag and shaking her head before looking over at him. “You can’t hold on to him in pieces. It has to be all or nothing, and you need to make that choice soon, because I think he’s tired of feeling like cracked glass.”

Alex takes another thirty seconds to continue inhaling and exhaling slowly before he puts his car into reverse and makes his way out of Sanders’. Rosa smiles over at him sadly and says, “And I think you are too.”

/

Rosa leaves Alex to check in on Isobel, to make sure she’s still doing alright with the cure. She appears in the middle of Isobel’s living room, where Noah stands nearby, holding a gun out. Her eyes widen as she sweeps the room for Isobel, putting herself between the two of them and yelling, “What the fuck!”

“What are you doing?” Isobel asks, and Rosa backs up closer to her, arms spread out.

“I don’t know,” Noah says, voice slightly hysterical. “I saw you in an egg, so I freaked out and bought a gun. I don’t… I don’t… I don’t even want a gun, but I’m married to an egg person!”

Rosa snarls at him and says, “You fucking bastard!” Her hands clench at her sides, body shaking with rage. “Scaring her like this, acting like you don’t know!”

“Could you put down the gun?” Isobel asks softly from behind her. “Baby, I come in peace.”

Rosa jerks her head back, scowling at Isobel. “Seriously?”

Noah stares at her for a long moment, and Rosa glares him down the entire time, daring him to make a move. She’s never been able to make physical contact with anyone in all these years, but the rage simmering through her right now makes her feel like she could just claw his eyes out, so easily.

Finally he sighs, lowering the gun and moving toward the couch. “I-I-I just…” He shakes his head as he shoves the gun back into his jacket pocket. “You were gone, and you didn’t say goodbye, and-and-and Max was  _ lying _ to me about where you were…” He looks back up to her, brows furrowed. “So I followed him and--” He shrugs, mouth open a bit; a convincing display of a confused, worried husband.

Rosa curls her lip at him and crosses her arms over her chest. “Cut the shit, you lying asshole.”

Isobel sighs and walks over to sit on one of the chairs, leaving a large gap between the two of them as she goes. “Baby, I promise I’ll explain everything,” she says, then gestures at the couch. “But you might want to take a seat. This will take a while.”

Noah watches her for a long moment, brows furrowed, before he shrugs off his coat and takes a seat on the couch, a little further away from Isobel than she had indicated. Rosa starts cursing him under her breath again when she sees the look on Isobel’s face at that. “Rat bastard,” she says, glaring at him from over Isobel’s shoulder.

She fixes her eyes on him as Isobel tells him their story, arms crossed tightly over her chest as she paces back and forth behind Isobel. She watches the play of emotions across his face--doubt, worry, even a slight bit of frustration, though nothing on the level she’d seen from him when he’d continuously failed to find Isobel over the last six weeks.

She hates that he’s playing his role so well Isobel doesn’t suspect a thing. Then he’s asking questions about what else she might know about herself, like where she’s from, and Rosa blurts out, “ _ You _ know! And you know  _ she _ doesn’t! So why are you asking, you prick?” She grips the back of Isobel’s chair, leaning forward as she yells at him from over Isobel’s shoulder.

And then Noah gets up to pace and asks Isobel, “Did you get in my head? Did you influence me? Did you...Did you make me love you?”

Rosa sees red. She snarls as she rounds the chair, arms outstretched, and her palms sink deep into his chest before she comes to a stop. She wrenches her hands out, fists clenched, and screams up at him as she brings her fists back down, trying to hit every part of him that’s within reach. “You fucking  _ dare _ to say that to her, after what you’ve done? After you  _ manipulated _ and  _ lied _ and  _ tricked _ her into loving you?”

He sits down on the end of the couch, still talking to Isobel, and Rosa points an accusing finger in his face. “Did you get into  _ her _ head? Influence  _ her _ ? Make  _ her _ love  _ you _ ?” She shakes her head, stepping back and biting her bottom lip as she watches him charm Isobel again, grant her his forgiveness for keeping her secret from him. “God, I hate you,” she says, taking a few more steps back and turning away when they start kissing and laughing together.

“I can’t watch this,” she says, shaking her head. So she leaves.

/

Rosa hasn’t seen Kyle since he found out their dad’s death was covered up by Jesse Manes, so she pops in on him to find he’s at the police station. He’s sitting in a chair across from his mom at her desk, so she sinks into the empty chair next to him and sighs.

Kyle asks, “What happened between Dad and Manes?”

Rosa’s eyebrows shoot up and she snorts. “You never were one for much subtlety, were you?” Hypocritical coming from her, she knows, but she’d hoped he would be a little more circumspect when looking into Jim’s death, especially if Manes was covering something up.

“They were friends,” Michelle answers. “Their relationship didn’t sour until you were a teenager.”

“Do you know why?” Kyle asks.

Rosa leans her head back on her chair and reaches her hand out to hover over Kyle’s arm.

“Jim said Jesse had no code,” Michelle answers. “He always said that. What he meant was Jesse had a  _ different _ code. Your father wasn’t really fit to judge, in the end.” She inhales sharply and pauses long enough that Rosa sits up straighter. “He cheated on me,” she tells Kyle, tears in her eyes. “Once with a girl half his age.”

Rosa sucks in a breath and leans toward her, shaking her head. “No,” she says, baffled. “I--”

“She was his daughter,” Kyle corrects her quietly.

“What?” Michelle asks.

“Rosa Ortecho,” Kyle says. “Dad wasn’t sleeping with her. She was his daughter. He was cheating with her mother.”

“I…” Rosa says again, shrugging. “I thought you knew. I thought that’s why you didn’t like me,” she says, looking at Kyle’s mom and remembering the fights she’d had with Jim about his drinking, especially around the anniversary of her death. “I couldn’t understand why you were so angry at him for mourning his own kid.” Even if she was the byproduct of one of his affairs.

She sits quietly and watches Kyle as his mom passes over their dad’s last letters to him, thinking about how badly she’d misjudged her. She rubs her eyes and leans back in the chair again. “Even when you’re dead you learn something new every day, apparently.”

/

Mimi’s alone in her room at Sunset Mesa when Rosa arrives, sitting on a chair by the window and reading a book.

“Hi, Mimi,” Rosa says, collapsing onto her bed with a huge sigh.

Mimi hums and closes the paperback on her finger, standing up to turn on the radio that’s sitting on her bedside table. She scrolls through the channels until she finds a local station that plays a good mix of the 80’s and 90’s, then sits back in her chair by the window, reopening her book to continue reading.

“Thanks,” Rosa says quietly. “I just...it’s been a bit of a day, and I needed…” She shrugs and rolls to her side, tracing the pattern on Mimi’s bedding as she talks. “I don’t know what I need. Therapy, for one,” she admits. “Like, probably a massive amount of it. But that’s not something I can get, as a dead woman, so here I am, hanging out with the only person who’s ever given any indication of knowing I’m here, possibly making you more crazy just by being here, but I-” She bites her lip and sits up. “I just don’t know where else to go.”

Mimi hums and closes her book on her finger again, her eyes slowly sweeping the room, pausing briefly on the bed--so near to where Rosa’s sitting that she holds her breath, waiting for Mimi to lock eyes with her--and then she goes back to her book.

Rosa lets out a long breath and flops back down onto the bed. “Well, you’ve never indicated you don’t like my visits before, so I’m going to keep coming,” she says, and she hears Mimi give an approving hum. She nods and licks her lips, saying, “I’ll start with the good news and work my way backward: Liz and Max finally kissed!” She glances over to see Mimi smiling at her book and continues, “And it was pretty freaking epic. Like, romantic speech, beautiful desert vista, the whole nine. I’m not saying I got all teary-eyed, but I’m not saying I  _ didn’t _ get all teary-eyed, you know what I’m saying?”

Mimi clears her throat and turns her page. Rosa’s lips twist and she continues, “Liz’s last serum was a success and they were able to get Isobel out of her pod. I know Max and Michael were having a hard time with her in there, and Liz was feeling guilty about almost killing her, so it’s good she’s out and cured.” She bites her lip and sighs, holding back on Noah for a moment because the rage is still pretty fresh. “What else?” she murmurs.

“Oh! You know how I told you about Alex and Michael?” she asks, sitting up to look at Mimi. “I thought they were going to cut the shit and be together, but then a couple months ago something happened and they, like, officially broke up, I guess? And Michael’s been flirting with Maria for the last, like, month,” she sees Mimi’s eyebrows raise. “I know, right? I thought it was just to pass the time, because they’ve always been really friendly with each other, but they totally had sex the other night!”

Mimi startles and drops her book into her lap, her gaze sweeping the room again. “I know, right?!” Rosa says, bouncing on the bed a little. Mimi shakes her head and lifts her book again, flipping through to find her page again. “But maybe it was just drunk sex, I don’t know. Either way, it’s going to complicate the fuck out of things, because this morning I found out Alex is still, like, pining away for Michael and Michael’s still just as gone on Alex. But then, why would he sleep with Maria if he still had feelings for Alex? Why would he do that, especially knowing they’re friends? He could have slept with literally anyone else, but he picked Maria? And how is that fair to her? She deserves better than runner-up, you know?”

Mimi hums in agreement and nods her head, turning her page with a small smile. “And did you know Jim’s wife thought he was having an affair with me?” she asks, fake gagging. “Even after I died, he didn’t tell her the truth about who I am to him. Do you think that’s messed up, or am I taking it too personally?” She sighs and says, “I guess I should just be glad Kyle finally knows.” Her nose scrunches up. “I know he doesn’t know I’ve been stalking him the last ten years, but I feel a little better about it now that he knows I’m his sister. Like, if he ever did find out somehow, at least now he knows it was someone who loved him who was haunting him, and not just his ex’s dead big sister.” She shakes her head and says, “Well anyway, I found out about that because Kyle’s one step closer to finding out our dad was killed by Jesse Manes. He knows Manes covered up the circumstances of his death, and he’s digging deeper into it.” She takes a second to breathe deep and she says quietly, “All of these secrets are unravelling all around me, and I’m so happy to see it, but it’s also so frustrating because I’m  _ right here _ , and I have all the answers, but no one can hear me.”

She lays back down on the bed, fingers linked over her stomach, and listens to the quiet sounds of the radio and Mimi turning a page in her book for the next several minutes before she sighs and says, “Isobel was safer in her pod, and I almost wish they would have left her in there.” Mimi sets her book down in her lap and hums, eyes sweeping the room until they land on the radio. Rosa continues, “She told Noah she’s an alien, and he had the fucking balls to accuse her of using her powers on him.” She presses down on her stomach, arms tense with her rage. “I have hated him for ten years for killing me, but every time I think I’ve seen the worst of him…” She shakes her head and scoffs. “God, I wanted so badly to tear his eyes out.”

“We will not vanish without a fight,” Mimi murmurs, eyes still fixed on the radio.

Rosa bolts upright. “Mimi?” she asks, scooting to the edge of the bed to watch her.

“Damn locusts,” Mimi says, scrunching her nose up. “I hope Liz is okay.”

Rosa leans back, brow furrowed. “Liz? Why would you--”

Behind her, the announcer on the radio is reporting there’s been an evacuation called at the hospital, and talk of gunfire. Rosa’s breath catches and she says, “Shit,” as she focuses hard on appearing at her sister’s side.

/

Surprised is not quite the word for how she feels when she appears in the middle of Liz’s lab with a bloody Noah at her feet, but it’s close enough. “What happened?” she asks, kneeling down to eye the wound Liz is pressing a towel to on Noah’s arm.

“Everything is gonna be okay,” Liz says to Noah and Isobel with a nod. “Just stay quiet. If he comes back--”

“Oh, God,” Noah says, sounding worried.

Rosa rolls her eyes and scoots back to sit on the floor and watch the door around Isobel. “Don’t even start, you son of a bitch.” She’s about to ask again what’s going on when Liz mentions there’s an active shooter in the hospital.

The door starts rattling and Rosa shoots to her feet, stepping quietly around Isobel to slip into the hall and check who it is. She lets out a relieved sigh when she sees Max outside the door, glancing up and down the empty hallway before he closes his eyes and the lights all around them start to flicker.

Isobel opens the door a moment later, ushering him in. “Is anyone hurt?” he asks, rushing over to check on Liz and Noah.

“I was freaking’ shot, man,” Noah says.

“No one cares, asshole,” Rosa mutters, pacing to the door as they lift Noah up and prepare to leave.

Max leads them out of the hospital and points them in the direction of the paramedics, then turns to Liz and says, “You stay with them, please. I’ll be back,” before turning around and heading back into the hospital.

“Max!” Rosa yells, along with Liz and Isobel. Liz lets out a frustrated huff and starts herding Noah and Isobel over to the paramedics, but Rosa scowls and runs back into the hospital after Max.

/

They’re creeping down the stairs, following a trail of blood, and Rosa keeps up a litany of whispered rebukes as they go. “You fucking moron, coming back in here alone. Where’s your backup? Do you even know who we’re looking for? Idiot.”

They get to the door to the basement and Max cracks it. They eye the darkness beyond and Rosa shakes her head. “Hell, no, Max. Stay here and call it in. Or-or-or wait for your hot partner! Where the hell is Cameron, anyways?” she asks, reaching out to put her hand on his arm.

He walks through it, lifting his flashlight and gun and calling out, “Sheriff’s department.”

Rosa follows behind, whispering, “Fuck, goddamn, shit.” Her breath catches when Max swings his flashlight around to reveal a bloodied man, huddled on the floor.

“I didn’t want to do this,” the man rasps out.

“Put that down. Slowly,” Max says of the gun the man’s holding.

“I don’t remember,” the man says, and Rosa steps around Max to kneel down next to him, studying his face while he tells Max he doesn’t know how he got down there. He looks so confused, and scared, staring at the gun in his hand like he’s never seen it before.

“Put the gun down!” Max orders him again, and when the man drops it, Max kicks it away and says, “Are you telling me you blacked out shooting up a hospital?”

Rosa stands up, lips pressed together, and shakes her head. “Noah. That--”

She turns to go find him, but that bastard’s latest victim starts shaking and choking, and Max has to help him through his seizure while he finally calls for backup.

“Why would Noah do this?” she asks Max, shaking her head. “It--It doesn’t make any sense.”

She stays with Max as Cameron arrives, along with some paramedics and the sheriff. She mulls over why Noah would shoot up the hospital--why he would get himself shot--as Max talks to the sheriff and Cameron starts helping the crime scene techs collect evidence.

When he’s done, Max finds Cameron and says, “Hey. The sheriff is transporting our perp to county.”

Cameron sighs and says, “The perp is my barista. He works at Bean Me Up. He draws little UFOs on the foam. He wouldn’t do this.”

Rosa nods. “Yeah. And another innocent victim of Noah Bracken gets fucked over by his sociopathic tendencies.”

“He says he remembers nothing,” Max says. “It’s starting to become a familiar refrain.”

“Three times is a pattern,” Rosa sing-songs, pacing next to them. “I just don’t get why. Isobel he took over to get to me. He hijacked Wyatt Long to get to Liz when she was snooping around too much. Why this guy?”

Cameron starts scolding Max for going after the shooter without backup, to which Rosa heartily nods along, then says, “ _ Liz _ was really scared. I don’t think she took a breath till Valenti said you were safe.” Rosa pauses in her pacing to look at her.

“Do you know where I can find her?” Max asks.

Rosa’s eyebrows shoot up and she turns to him to say, “Really? You’re not going to address the fact that this woman was also scared for you? In a very obvious more-than-a-friend way?”

Apparently he is, because Cameron tells him Liz’s wing of the hospital is open again, and he leaves to go find her.

“Sorry, hot partner,” Rosa calls back to Cameron as she follows after him. “Apparently there’s only room for one alien love triangle in this town, and this ain’t it.”

/

They find Liz in her darkened lab, and the sound of broken glass crunching beneath their feet has Rosa whistling and saying, “What the hell happened in here?” It’s burned all to hell, there’s glass everywhere, and several shelves have been knocked over. She starts looking around as Liz and Max check in with each other and make sure they’re okay.

Max pulls away from her and says, “Liz, this was the only part of the hospital that burned. I think this was a targeted attack.”

Rosa nods, ducking down to see if she can see into the drawer where the alien serums were being kept, but there’s nothing in there. “I guess this gives me the ‘why’. Noah didn’t want you guys to have a weapon you could use against him, and he wanted his own dose of the cure just in case.”

Liz hasn’t caught on that it’s an alien thing though; she thinks it’s part of her stem cell research.

“Our suspect is Connor Smith,” Max tells her, shaking his head. “He’s a pacifist who likes latte art. He says he doesn’t remember any of this, that he blacked it out.”

Liz straightens at that, and Rosa nods. “There it is.” She steps up next to her and runs a hand down Liz’s arm.

Max shakes his head and says, “When I found him, he didn’t seem violent. He was cowering, and then, he had a seizure, so I hauled him out.”

“Wait. Connor. He used to work at the Crashdown before he abandoned us for Bean Me Up,” Liz says. “He’s epileptic.”

Max nods. “That would explain the seizure.”

Liz turns to the burned-out husk of her desk. “Max, what…?” She sees the drawer that used to contain her serum is empty. “No, what-what if this isn’t about my study?” she says, turning back to him. “What if this is about the other things I’ve been working on here? The antidote and the serum, they’re all gone.”

Rosa leans back against the counter between them, holding her breath, watching the thoughts cross Liz’s mind a moment before she voices them. “Today was like Wyatt Long at Grant Green’s warehouse all over again,” Liz says, putting the pieces together. “Wyatt said that he blacked out after a bender at the Wild Pony when he torched me. Connor has epileptic blackouts. I mean… What if the fourth alien can…?”

Max picks up on her train of thought. “Get in people’s mind when they’re blacked out and convince them to commit murder?”

“You said Isobel’s blackouts started after trauma when you were a kid,” Liz points out, and when Max confirms that she continues, “So all three murderers have preexisting conditions that cause blackouts.”

Rosa makes a noise low in her throat and covers her mouth with her hands, shaking her head. “Oh my god, Lizzie,” she says, tears filling her eyes.

“But what if we’re not looking for three murderers?” Liz asks Max. “What if we’re just looking for one murderous mind-influencer?”

A bubble of laughter escapes Rosa’s mouth and she shakes her head, jumping up and down. “Elizabeth!”

A moment later, when Liz says to Max, “I think your sister may be innocent of all of this,” Rosa screams and spins in place, ecstatic they’ve finally figured out Isobel wasn’t the one who killed her.

/

She goes to the Pony to celebrate. Sure, it’s not like she can drink, and it’s not like anyone’s there or could even notice her, but she wants to tell her best friend. She shows up in the middle of the bar floor, still spinning, singing, “Maria! Maria! Maria!”

Maria’s behind the bar, reshelving empty glasses and reorganizing the liquor. Rosa runs up and boosts herself up to lay across the bar, continuing to sing, but Maria’s preoccupied and doesn’t even twitch. Rosa fake pouts and says, “What’s got you so glum, chum?” She feels too light to even care about how stupid that sounded.

The door opens and Rosa turns to see who’s just waltzing in after closing and her smile dims a little when she sees Michael.

Maria continues shelving glasses and calls out, “We’re closed!” She turns around and a panicked look enters her eyes when she sees who it is.

Rosa’s brow furrows and she sits up, crossing her legs beneath her and watching the two of them. “What’s going on?”

Michael holds out Maria’s necklace and Maria says softly, “You found my necklace.”

“Clasp broke,” he says as she takes it from him. “I fixed it. I think it calls for a celebration. And by celebration, I mean booze.” He smiles that ever-charming smile at Maria and Rosa sucks in a breath.

“Guerin!” Rosa yells, slamming her hand on the bar. “You  _ just _ had a heart-to-heart with Alex this morning. Don’t tell me you forgot about it in the last few hours!” She licks her lips. “And even if you did, Maria is  _ off limits _ for a rebound.”

“Alex is one of my best friends,” Maria says, leaning closer to him across the bar.

Rosa’s eyes widen and she says, “He  _ told _ you?”

Michael’s whole face closes off. “Congrats,” he says flatly.

Maria shakes her head and says, “I never would have slept with you if I knew you two had a history. It can’t happen again.”

Rosa lets out a long breath and nods. “Good idea,” she murmurs.

Michael swallows hard and nods, holding Maria’s gaze for a long moment before he says, “You keep saying that.” His voice wobbles. “I got it.” His smile is brittle, and Rosa hates it, and she hates that she doesn’t have it in her to comfort him because it’s about Maria.

Maria turns away, using the mirror behind the bar to put her necklace back on. “Come back when we’re open,” she says to him into the mirror.

His fake smile drops as he looks down at the bar. “Right,” he says, looking back at her and nodding once before turning around and leaving.

The door closes behind him and Rosa jumps off the bar with a sigh. Maria slams her hands on the back counter, startling her into turning around.

“Maria?” Rosa asks quietly, walking around the bar to her.

Maria’s eyes are closed, palms flat on the counter where she’d slammed them half a minute before. Her chest expands with every deep breath she takes, nostrils flaring as she presses her lips together, hard.

“Maria?” Rosa whispers, gliding her hand over Maria’s hair. She jumps when Maria suddenly whirls around, dropping to sit on the floor, knees bent up to support her elbows, hands covering her face.

Rosa drops down next to her, a hand hovering just over one of her knees. Maria’s not crying yet, but her shoulders are shaking as her breath shudders. “God damn it,” she says loudly, voice shaking.

Rosa sighs, dropping her forehead to Maria’s knee and saying, “Pretty much.”


	11. Champagne Supernova

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Isobel was remembering her.
> 
> Rosa sits on top of the counter at the Crashdown next to Michael as Isobel recounts every memory she’s recovered about her time with Rosa to Noah, Max, Michael, and Liz.
> 
> Isobel had been remembering her because of Liz’s serum, and that’s the other reason Noah had decided to shoot up the hospital: he hadn’t wanted Isobel to realize it hadn’t actually been her.
> 
> “Joke’s on you, motherfucker,” Rosa says smugly, leaning back to watch the group discuss this new knowledge.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The next chapter is nearly ready, but I haven't finished the finale yet. Hoping to finish it this weekend, but I got the mother of all colds this week, so we will see how I'm feeling
> 
> Episode dialogue from transcripts.foreverdreaming.org.
> 
> Thanks to insidiousintent for the beta!

Isobel was  _ remembering _ her.

Rosa sits on top of the counter at the Crashdown next to Michael as Isobel recounts every memory she’s recovered about her time with Rosa to Noah, Max, Michael, and Liz.

Isobel had been remembering her because of Liz’s serum, and that’s the other reason Noah had decided to shoot up the hospital: he hadn’t wanted Isobel to realize it hadn’t actually been her.

“Joke’s on you, motherfucker,” Rosa says smugly, leaning back to watch the group discuss this new knowledge.

Liz fills the mug at Michael’s hip with coffee and leans on the counter between him and Rosa. “So we’re back to square one. Anyone could have killed my sister,” she says. She paces further away as Rosa leans forward to run her hand over Liz’s hair.

They start reviewing the information they know about the other victims. Rosa’s gaze stays fixed on Noah. He’s doing a commendable job of playing the concerned citizen, but she sees his eyes sharpen when Liz mentions having more of the alien-killing serum. “Fuck,” Rosa whispers.

“How does the killer know about the serum?” Isobel asks.

Rosa rolls her eyes and leans forward to sit cross-legged next to Michael. “You told him,” she grumbles, resting her face in her hands, elbows on her knees.

“Killer seems to know about everything,” Michael says. “They could’ve possessed anyone at any time. They could’ve overheard us.”

Rosa leans into him, an attempt at a nudge. “Or his wife decided to tell him about it of her own volition, not realizing he was a psychopathic murderer.”

“They’ve gotten away with 14 murders,” Max says. “They need to believe they’re still in the clear.”

Rosa snorts. “Bit late for that.”

Noah acts doubtful that they can pretend like nothing’s wrong and aliens don’t exist, and Rosa rolls her eyes. She’s seen him play loving husband one minute and crazy murderer the next; she can read the calculated act in his eyes. He’s already working on a plan to throw them off his scent.

The group disperses, promising to go about their regular business to lull the murderer into a false sense of complacency. Rosa groans and shakes her head, leaning forward to rest it on her raised knees as Michael slides off the counter to leave with Noah and Isobel.

Max takes the opportunity to slide behind the counter with Liz and smile down at her. “Hey, so...this gala tonight,” he starts, and Rosa huffs out a laugh, shaking her head. “Would you be my date?” he asks.

Rosa smiles and looks over at Liz, who scrunches up her nose and says, “Unfortunately, I’ve already accepted another man’s request for my company.”

Max freezes, his shoulders tensing up, but then they relax when he remembers. “Right. Your dad.”

Rosa makes a high noise in her throat and says, “Maybe if you hadn’t waited until the day of the event, she would have been able to say yes, you giant idiot.”

They promise to see each other there, though, and as Max is turning to leave Liz asks, “Your ballroom dancing skills improve since high school?”

Rosa tilts her head at her sister, smiling. “When did you ballroom dance with him, Elizabeth? You never told me that!”

Max assures her he’s gotten much worse, which is a total lie; Rosa had been at Isobel and Noah’s wedding. She’d seen Max’s skills on the dance floor, and he was not bad at all.

Liz makes a face like she’s dreading dancing with him, but it’s totally ruined by the smile and general excited glow she has about her at the prospect of spending an evening dressed up and dancing with Max Evans.

Rosa rolls her eyes and sticks her tongue out at Liz. “Okay, you’re getting too mushy and glow-y for me. I gotta go before I overdose on sap,” she says, and then she leaves to check in on her other sibling.

/

Kyle and Alex have been working on decoding the symbols scrawled all over Jim’s last pieces of correspondence to Kyle before he died. They’ve gotten the name “Caulfield” and know it’s a prison north of Roswell, but there’s not much else that can be discerned until they actually go there.

Rosa’s been by to check on the facility, just to make sure Jesse’s not there, and to see if Alex and Kyle would encounter any other serious threats, should they decide to visit. Flint’s there, and a handful of scientists and other security personnel, all pulled from various branches of the armed forces, but that’s it. They could probably sneak in, with enough preparation.

But they’re not to that point yet. Rosa has never known Alex to do anything without first understanding all the risks involved. This characteristic frequently fucks him over in his personal life, but it’s been instrumental in keeping him alive for the last ten (or more) years. This is the only reason Rosa grudgingly allows him to wait and come up with a solid plan for Caulfield rather than bitching him out about it every time she sees him.

Kyle’s just coming off a night shift and Alex has the day off, so they’re both at the Project Shepherd bunker rather early, digging through more boxes in an effort to find out more about Caulfield and “7A-N38”.

Kyle drains his coffee mug, eyes bloodshot, and drops his head onto the pile of papers in front of him. “I went to med school. I am a doctor. I should be able to handle pulling an all-nighter and staying awake the next day.”

Alex snorts and shakes his head, eyes not leaving the screen in front of him. “You’re getting old. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

Rosa laughs and trails her fingers over the papers on the table, skimming them for any information she doesn’t already know. “You’re not that much younger, babe.”

Kyle turns his head and glares at Alex’s back. “You’re less than a year younger than me, and every time I come here, you’re already here, all wide-eyed and bushy-tailed. How is that possible?”

Alex smirks and glances over his shoulder at Kyle. “Maybe I’m just tougher than you?”

Rosa rolls her eyes, lips twitching, and moves further along the table. Nothing she didn’t already know; most of the papers are documentation from the original crash and the immediate autopsies and experiments, and there’s nothing from after 1965.

Kyle narrows his eyes at Alex and Alex mirrors him, until he finally rolls his eyes and swivels around in his chair, nodding his head over to the back corner of the bunker and says, “There’s a rollaway cot. I’ve been catnapping while my programs decrypt the information on these servers.”

Rosa looks over at Alex and sighs, “You shouldn’t be, it’s not healthy.”

Kyle seems to be thinking along the same lines, because he sits up again and shakes his head. “How long since you’ve spent a significant amount of time out of this bunker and out in the sun?” he asks Alex.

Alex rolls his eyes and turns back to the screens. “Don’t start,” he says.

Kyle stands up, groaning a little bit, and walks over to lean on the desk next to Alex. “As your doctor,” he starts. Alex glares up at him and Kyle rolls his eyes, hastily amending with, “As  _ a _ doctor, and as someone who cares about you…” This time Alex snorts a laugh and Kyle glares. “I feel I need to remind you that actual human beings need things like fresh air, sunlight, and sleep in a bed that is not a tiny cot in a secret military bunker, in order to properly function long-term.”

Rosa finishes looking over the papers on the table and shifts to Alex’s other side, eyes skimming the information she can discern from the screens he has up. “He’s not wrong,” she murmurs, placing her hand over Alex’s shoulder.

“I know that,” Alex grits out, rolling his eyes again. “But I also know there’s something  _ off _ about this Caulfield place, and I’d rather know what it is sooner than later, because I don’t know how much longer my dad’s going to stay out of Roswell.” He takes a short breath and shakes his head, continuing with, “And when he gets back, all bets are off as to how he’s going to come after me for blackmailing him in the first place, and on top of  _ that _ , I owe Michael as much information as I can give him about the crash and--”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Kyle says, reaching forward, his hand hovering over Alex’s arm.

Rosa keeps her hand just over Alex’s shoulder, and runs her other one over his hair, eyebrows furrowed as she looks down at him and hums a few soothing notes.

Alex’s eyes had slammed shut the moment Kyle reached out for him, and he’s breathing unsteadily, shaky breaths exhaled through a slightly parted mouth. The three of them are still for a minute as Alex’s breathing evens out. When he opens his eyes again, Kyle tilts his head and raises an eyebrow. Alex presses his lips together and nods once, and Kyle nods back. Rosa lets out a long breath and steps back.

Alex turns back to his computer and Kyle watches him for a minute before he says quietly, “Why do you feel like you owe Guerin?”

Alex freezes for a second, then shakes his head and continues his work. He replies without looking back at Kyle, “Your medical degree mean you can psychoanalyze your patients?”

Kyle shrugs and frowns. “No, but it doesn’t take a psychologist to see there’s a link between your...enthusiasm to find out as much as you can about this project and your feelings for Guerin.”

Alex bites the inside of his lip as he continues working. Rosa sighs and steps away from him to lean on the other side of his desk from Kyle. “Tell him,” she says. “It’s not like you’ll talk about it with Maria because she likes Michael too.”

The bunker’s quiet except for the clacking of Alex’s keyboard, but after a few minutes Alex lets out a slow breath and turns to face Kyle. 

Kyle raises an eyebrow in encouragement. Rosa stands behind Alex again, hands hovering over his shoulders.

“I owe him because I’m the cause of a lot of pain in his life, including some things he doesn’t even know about yet.” He jerks his chin in the direction of one of the lockers.

Kyle glances over at it and shakes his head. “I don’t understand.”

Rosa and Alex sigh together. “He needs that piece to finish rebuilding his ship. I didn’t tell him I have it.”

“Why not?” Kyle asks, head cocked.

Alex presses his lips together and glares at him, eyes shining.

“Oh,” Kyle says softly. He swallows and says tentatively, “Did you tell him how you feel?”

Rosa buries her face in her hands, her muffled and exasperated, “Kyle!” echoed by Alex’s frustrated one.

“What?” Kyle shrugs, voice high.

Alex shakes his head and licks his lips. “You don’t understand.”

Kyle rolls his eyes and crosses his arms over his chest. “So help me understand.”

Alex is quiet for a long time before he says, “We have a...complicated history. I…” He sighs and rubs his hands over his face, smiling wryly. He looks up at Kyle. “You’re right.”

Kyle raises an eyebrow in question.

“Yes, tell him!” Rosa says, pumping her fists. “Unburden yourself! Get advice from someone who is not dead!”

Alex shakes his head. “I should take a break, get out of here. You should, too,” he says mildly, raising an eyebrow at Kyle. “You look terrible, old man.”

“Boo!” Rosa says, sticking her tongue out at Alex.

Kyle rolls his eyes but nods and lets it go, pushing off from the desk and flipping Alex off as he heads for the door. “I’m only six months older than you, Manes!”

/

Maria’s just pulling up to the Crashdown when Rosa pops in on her. “Please tell me things are going better for you than they are for…” She looks at the roof of the truck, thinking about all of the fucked up situations her friends are in at the moment. On a sigh she looks back at Maria, “Well, anyone else at the moment. Give me a little good, DeLuca!”

Maria’s lips twitch and she shakes her head once as she puts the truck into park and jumps out. Rosa rolls her eyes and follows. 

On the way in, they pass Michael. Maria’s whole body tenses when she sees him, but she doesn’t even acknowledge him as they pass. Michael calls her out for it, and she denies, but Rosa has to roll her eyes and groan, because Maria’s always been a terrible liar.

She deflects. “You’re not going to the gala, then?”

Michael sounds regretful when he says, “No. No, I couldn’t decide which of my tuxedos to wear, so I’m gonna skip it.”

“Alex is skipping it, too,” Maria says. “I guess he spent enough time there during high school.”

Rosa sighs and throws her hands up in the air. “What are you doing? Maria.”

Maria’s eyes search Michael’s face as he steps closer and earnestly says, “Look, it’s over. It’s  _ been _ over. You didn’t do anything wrong.”

Rosa looks up at him and shakes her head. “No, she didn’t, but you still put her in the position of sleeping with her best friend’s ex, and that was a really shitty move, Guerin.” She sighs and follows him back to his truck.

/

She rides with Michael back to the junkyard and joins him down in his bunker as he works on his ship. She sits on the table next to him as he works, eyes roaming the schematics he’s drawn up, admiring the clean lines and angles. “What are you going to do about the situation with Maria and Alex?” she asks, legs swinging back and forth by his hip.

He shifts position, shaking out his leg, and scratches his cheek.

“I think you really do like her, and I think  _ you _ think you could really have something with her. You’re…” She grasps at the air tilting her head to the side. “You’re softer with her, like you truly care about her.” It’s the same way he is around Isobel. She leans back on her elbows to better see his face. “But you’ve been hung up on Alex for  _ ten years _ . You don’t just  _ move on _ from that kind of thing in the span of a couple of days, or even weeks. I think you’re using her to try to forget him.” She takes a deep breath and nods. “You’d never say it, probably because you yourself don’t see it, but you’re making her a consolation prize. A second-best choice, and we both know Maria deserves better than that.” She stares over at him, willing him to understand what she’s trying to say. “So I’m gonna need you to take a step back from her, Guerin. For all of your sakes.”

Michael’s hand must cramp up then because he drops his materials and leans away from the table, swearing. He tries flexing it out, then moves to grab his jacket so he can go outside for a breather. From the jacket pocket, a yellow smoke starts filling the room.

Rosa jumps off the table. “Fuck!” she yells, reaching out for Michael as he coughs and starts staggering backwards. “Michael!” He falls backward, splayed out on the floor, and Rosa kneels down next to him, hands planted on either side of his head. “Michael!” she yells, watching as his eyes grow hazy and finally shut. The yellow smoke is still filling the room. She looks around, frantic, slams her hands on the ground, and yells, “Fuck!”

/

“Max!” she yells as she appears in the middle of the police station. She whirls around, absently noting Wyatt Long in the jail cell across from her, and sees Max and Cameron talking with their backs to him. “Max!” she yells again as she runs up to him.

“It’s not Maria,” Max is saying to Cameron, and that stops Rosa in her tracks.

“What’s not Maria?” she asks, looking between them.

From the rest of their conversation, she gathers they think Maria could be the fourth alien. “Racist fucker,” Rosa spits over at Wyatt Long when she learns he’s the one who made them think it was Maria. “It’s not Maria,” Rosa says, turning back to Max and Cameron. “And you have another problem to deal with right now.”

Max leaves after chewing out Wyatt for shooting up the Crashdown in June and Rosa jogs to keep up with him. “Don’t get me wrong, I am thrilled Wyatt’s being punished for shooting Liz, but I really need you to check in on your brother, like, right now.”

She follows him as he collects his outfit for the gala from one of the closets in the back room at the station, a constant litany of, “Find Michael, find Michael,” spilling from her lips as she does so. She leaves him alone when he goes into the bathroom to change, but she’s back at him when he exits, wearing an all-black suit and a bolo tie. “God, don’t you have that weird alien sense? Your brother is in trouble, and I need you to find him, Max!”

She keeps up with him as he collects the flowers he’s going to give Liz, as he calls out to Cam that he’ll see her at the gala, as he exits the door to the station, all while begging him to check in on Michael. 

She continues begging until someone passes through her to slam an empty wine bottle into Max’s temple. Rosa screams and jumps back, lifting her hands to cover her mouth. Max is unconscious on the ground, and Noah--that motherfucker--lifts him into the back of a nearby car.

“Fuck!” Rosa yells, stomping her foot. Now she needs to find someone to rescue both Michael  _ and _ Max.

/

“Liz!” Rosa knows her sister is expecting to see Max at the gala, and she shows up in their room as Liz is finishing up her makeup in the mirror in their bedroom. “Lizzie,” she says, leaning in front of the mirror to get in her sister’s face. “You need to call Max, text him, something!” She’ll know something’s up when Max never texts back.

Instead, Liz picks up a bright red and a dark mauve lipstick, eyes flicking between both as she bites her lip.

Rosa slams her hand down through the outstretched lip colors. “Liz! Screw worrying about your armor tonight! There are more important things! I need you to try to call Max!” She moves in as close as she can, palms on either side of Liz’s face, willing her sister to meet her eyes.

Liz sighs and her lips twist as she puts down the mauve, opting for her red armor.

Rosa yells in frustration, stomps her foot, and leaves.

/

She cycles through their group of friends quickly, but of course no one can hear her yelling at them to go rescue Max and Michael.

When she gets back to the bunker, Max is there and unconscious still, though Michael is stirring. Rosa kneels next to him as he awakens and sits up, eyeing the room and putting together what’s happened. He sees Max on the floor a few feet away and scrambles over to him, still staggering a bit.

“Max?” he says, placing his fingers on Max’s neck. His whole body sags and he lets out a gust of air when he finds his pulse. He stands again, slower this time, and scrunches his nose at the yellow powder that’s covering practically everything in the room. “What the fuck is that?” he murmurs to himself.

Rosa sighs and follows him as he makes his way over to the bunker ladder. “What I want to know is where he got the smoke bomb full of it,” she says, crossing her arms over her chest and watching Michael narrow his eyes at the bunker door.

He lets out a huff and shakes out his shoulders, then narrows his eyes further.

Rosa shakes her head. “Won’t work, Mikey. I think you’ve gotta wait for someone to come find you.” She paces around him as he grows increasingly more frustrated at being unable to use his powers to open the hatch. “Hopefully soon, because Isobel’s up there with Noah, without alien backup.”

Max wakes up a few minutes later, after Michael’s resorted to more human methods of trying to escape, and they start bickering almost immediately.

Rosa rolls her eyes and says, “Now that I know you’re both okay, I’m gonna go keep an eye on Isobel until someone notices you’re both missing.”

/

Isobel’s at the gala with Noah, watching Graham Green give a speech. Rosa moves to stand at Isobel’s side, glaring over at Noah; the asshole gives Isobel a little smile and Rosa wants to punch him in his stupid smug face.

The speech ends and Isobel and Noah move away from the stage to talk. Isobel brings up the fact that Max isn’t at the gala yet, and Rosa’s eyes narrow at him when he says, “I’m sure he’ll be here soon. Just try to relax and enjoy yourself.”

Rosa growls at him, arms crossed over her chest. “Shut the fuck up, you asshole.”

Isobel starts ranting, but Noah soothes her with reassurances he will take care of things for her, including promising her he’ll call Max.

Rosa rolls her eyes as she stands on her toes to get into his face. “Whatever you’re up to tonight, I hope it fails spectacularly, and I hope Isobel’s there to finally see you for what you are.”

Noah leaves, but Rosa resolves to stay with Isobel as much as she can for the rest of the night, at least until one of her brothers is there to protect her. She follows her around the party, tuning out Isobel’s country club small talk, eyes constantly scanning the room for Noah or anything else suspicious.

After a while, Isobel cuts the fake laughs and mind-numbingly boring small talk for long enough to step into an alcove to try calling Max again. “Where the hell are you?” she speaks quietly but forcefully into the phone, eyes scanning to make sure no one’s around. “You’re supposed to be here, pretending everything’s alright, and making goo-goo eyes at Liz Ortecho, and generally being a supportive brother during this  _ very _ trying time in my life, and you’re nowhere to be seen.” She takes a slow breath and her voice wobbles a little as she says, “I’m worried. At least text me to let me know you’re alright.”

Rosa runs a hand down Isobel’s back as she turns back to the party, another megawatt smile pasted on her lips. “He’d be here if he could,” she murmurs, following Isobel back into the crowd.

A while later, Isobel’s heading to the fringes to try to call Max again when they hear Cameron and Liz behind one of the curtains in one of the exhibits.

“He’s not here yet,” Liz is saying to Cameron.

Isobel pushes into the exhibit, saying, “No, he’s not. And if he doesn’t pick up his phone soon, I’m gonna murder him.”

Rosa groans and runs a hand down the side of her face. “Is.”

Isobel shrugs, arms crossed over her chest. “Too soon?”

“Yes,” Rosa breathes out, then starts pacing around the room, poking her head out to make sure no one else is listening in, as Cameron tells Liz and Isobel that she and Max found out Maria might be the fourth alien.

Liz shakes her head, eyes wide. “What? No. Absolutely not.”

Cameron’s voice is certain, and a little apologetic, while she lays out what they discovered. “She was in an altercation with one of the murderer’s victims the night she died. It’s circumstantial, but we have to look into it.”

Isobel holds up a hand. “Wait a second, that--that actually makes sense.” Rosa and Liz scoff at the same time, and Isobel continues, “Because when I tried to influence her, I got violently ill, and then I woke up in the desert with no clue how I got there.”

Rosa exhales slowly and shakes her head. “Yeah, but Maria didn’t do that. Your husband did.”

Cameron picks up the thread by listing other details that give Maria opportunity, which Isobel compounds by adding Maria’s love for Rosa as motive.

Liz takes a deep breath and shakes her head, saying, “Maria is my best friend.”

“Yeah, who knows about obscure zodiac lore, and who’s still obsessed with your sister’s favorite music, and knew all of her secret hiding spots,” Isobel interrupts. “Give us a reason it can’t be true, Liz.”

Rosa stops pacing and moves to stand next to her sister, close enough their shoulders almost brush. “Lizzie, you know it’s not Maria. Focus on the fact that your boyfriend’s not here yet; that’s much more concerning, and will lead you to the real killer that much faster.”

The three of them are still arguing over whether or not the fourth alien is Maria, but it’s been a while since she’s checked in on Max and Michael, so she leaves Isobel with two of the most capable and trustworthy women she knows and disappears back to Michael’s bunker.

/

The boys are bickering, as per usual, but they’re up and awake, so for the moment, they’re okay. Since Isobel’s with Cameron and Liz, Rosa figures it’s probably the best time for her to check in on Noah, to see if she can discern what exactly his endgame is for the night.

She focuses her thoughts on Noah’s stupid, smug face, thinks about his voice begging her for forgiveness every year on the anniversary of her death, lets the rage she feels toward him fill her up and pull her out of the bunker and into...the women’s bathroom at the UFO Emporium?

Maria’s there, standing in front of the mirror, eyes hazy as she looks herself over. “Maria?” Rosa asks, looking around for Noah. It’s odd that she’d focused on him and ended up in the women’s room, but maybe he’s hiding out in there as part of his dastardly plan?

Rosa moves to check the stalls just as Liz walks in. “Hey, I was looking for you,” she says to Maria. “Can we bail on this thing?”

Rosa pops her head out of the stall she’d walked into, brows furrowed. “What? Why?”

“I need some girl time. It’s the blonde leading the blonde out there,” Liz explains.

Maria takes a sip of her champagne and says, “I’m having fun. Isobel went all out planning this thing.”

Liz pouts, but Rosa sucks in a sharp breath, rushing back over to her. “Maria?” she asks, voice cracking. She places her hands on either side of Maria’s face, wishing she could nudge her head down to look her in the eyes. “Honey?”

Liz enters one of the stalls, stating she needs to adjust her underwear, leaving Maria to watch her purse.

Maria asks, “Can I borrow some lip gloss?” and reaches for Liz’s purse.

Rosa snarls and says, “Noah, you motherfucker. You get out of her head right now. You fucking piece of shit.” She steps back and watches as Noah uses Maria’s body to steal the syringe of Liz’s serum from her purse and move toward the door.

“Liz! Find your motherfucking boyfriend!” she yells back into the bathroom as she follows Maria out.

/

She follows Maria through the party to the other side of the museum, yelling her name, swiping her hands through Maria’s arms, anything to try to get her attention, but she doesn’t even blink. Though that makes sense because it’s not really Maria.

Maria walks to one of the closed off exhibit areas, where Noah is waiting for her. He takes the syringe from her purse, and leaves her splayed out on an examination table, unconscious.

“You asshole!” she yells after him as he leaves. Her hands shake as she runs them over Maria’s body, checking her over, and leans her head next to Maria’s mouth to check her breathing. “Maria, hon, I need you to wake up, please,” she says, then presses her lips together and shakes her head. “I just need you to tell me you’re alright.”

She runs her fingers over Maria’s hair, presses her palm to her cheek, and keeps begging her to wake up, furious with Noah for taking her like that and scared out of her mind that someone will find Maria unconscious and do something to her while she’s unable to defend herself, accompanied only by a ghost who would be helpless, forced to just sit there and watch.

It must only be a few minutes but it feels like hours later when Liz enters, letting out a relieved sigh and calling out, “Found her!”

“Thank God,” Rosa says, sagging against the table.

Liz rushes over and lifts Maria’s wrist, pressing her fingers to her pulse. “She’s still breathing,” she tells Isobel as she bursts in. “And her pulse is steady.”

Isobel comes around to the other side of the table and looks down at Maria in concern. “According to the internet, she just needs to, to sleep it off,” she says.

Rosa watches as Liz digs through Maria’s purse. “The syringe is gone. She must have handed it off to the real killer,” she says.

“Oh my God,” Isobel says, bringing a hand to her forehead.

“Which means whoever it is, they’re onto us,” Liz says.

“Really need Max here,” Isobel says, looking down at her phone.

Rosa’s eyes snap to hers. “Yes! You’re getting it! Now I need you to realize that the only reason he’s not here yet is because he’s in trouble!”

Isobel and Liz veer off into an argument about the reasons Liz left Roswell ten years ago and Liz’s tendency to bail, all while Rosa paces along the bottom of the table Maria’s laid out on. Finally she throws her hands up into the air and yells, “Oh my god, can you please bicker about this later?! Maria’s been roofied by a sociopath, and Max and Michael are trapped in an underground bunker! You can fight about who loves Max more once he’s been rescued!”

They pause in their argument as Isobel keeps trying to text Max, and Rosa lets out a slow breath, groaning in frustration.

“Damn it,” Isobel says as she continues scrolling through her phone. “Michael said he’d be home all night, but I can’t locate him or Max. That’s not normal. Wherever they are, they must not have any service.”

Liz’s eyes light with an idea and Rosa sighs in relief. “I know a dead zone,” Liz says. “I think I know there they might be. I have to go.” She’s already halfway out the door by the time she finishes her sentence.

“Bless you, Elizabeth Ortecho,” Rosa says, covering her face with her hands.

/

Rosa stays with Isobel and Maria and paces the length of the room, biting her thumbnail as she goes. Maria’s started groaning, her body twitching a little, and every time she does, Rosa runs over, calling her name. She’s not waking up yet, but it’s relieving to see her moving into a more natural sleep.

Isobel’s been gripping her phone, rubbing the edges and breathing deep to keep herself calm, back stiff and straight as she shifts from side to side next to Maria. Every time Rosa paces back to check on Maria, she runs a hand down Isobel’s back, trying to comfort her.

Finally, Liz comes back, Michael and Max in tow. Rosa rushes over to stand by Isobel, whose whole body sagged just a little when her brothers finally walked in.

“Did she wake up?” Liz asks, checking on Maria again.

“No, she’s been stirring, but she’s still out,” Isobel tells them. 

Michael moves to Isobel’s side, by Maria’s head, flexing his hand. Rosa sighs and shakes her head.

“We need to get her out of here before the killer notices we’re all MIA,” Max says.

“No,” Michael says, shaking his head. He tears his eyes away from Maria to address the rest of them. “You said the killer needs to have a false sense of complacency, so he doesn’t strike before Ranchero Night. Go out to the party.”

“No,” Liz denies promptly. “I don’t want to leave Maria alone.”

“Let me,” he says, indicating he’ll stay with Maria. “I swear I will explode anyone who comes near her with my brain.”

The others are content to let Michael watch over Maria, but Rosa hesitates. Finally, she growls and walks up to him, putting her finger in his face. “Listen up, Guerin. I know you care about her, so you better make damn sure Noah doesn’t get his grimy mitts on her again, you got it?”

He leans over Maria, quietly imploring her to wake up, and Rosa presses her lips together, hard. She shakes her head, but leaves to catch up with the others, and to see if she can find Noah.

/

Max and Liz are out on the dance floor, and a quick scan of the room tells Rosa they’re the closest, so she slips through the crowd toward them. “Please tell me you two are brainstorming about how to get Noah to show his hand,” she says as she sidles up to them.

“I thought at first you were standing me up,” Liz is saying.

Rosa groans. “I guess not.”

“You know I wouldn’t,” Max says.

Rosa starts circling around them, up on her tiptoes so she can scan the crowd for Isobel, or Cameron, or Noah would be ideal. She needs to figure out what else he might be up to, now that he’s got the serum.

“I know, but when the thought occurred to me, I was relieved,” Liz says, and Rosa pauses to turn back to her, head tilted to the side. Max is frozen in front of her. Liz continues, “Like...glad you were gonna be the one to mess this thing up first, not me.”

Rosa sighs and reaches her hand out to place it over her sister’s shoulder. “Liz,” she says quietly.

“There is something in my heart that always wants to make a break for it,” Liz explains. “To leave, before--”

“Before you get left,” Max says with a nod. “Doesn’t take a scientist to figure out why. I know your mom hurt you. So if you, if you want to pump the breaks on this…”

He starts stepping away from Liz, and Rosa steps forward, hands held out and shaking her head. “No!” she and Liz say at the same time.

Liz’s fingers clutch the edges of his jacket, keeping him from pulling farther away. “The truth is, you don’t make me feel safe or comfortable,” Liz tells him.

Rosa’s head rears back. “That’s a weird way to tell someone you love them,” she murmurs. Max looks down, shoulders hunched.

But Liz continues with, “You make me feel like I am teetering on the edge of a cliff, and…” Her breath hitches, and she leans down to catch Max’s eye, to drag his gaze back up. “And I’m getting addicted to that feeling. It’s overwhelming.”

Max smiles and Rosa lets out a long breath, shaking her head.

“But if I mess up,” Liz says, voice low. “If I cave and take off again, I need you to follow me this time. Don’t let me go that easily again, okay?” Her voice wobbles at the end.

Rosa wants to reach out and comfort her, but she doesn’t. Max is there, and she knows he will. Besides, they’ve got other problems;  _ someone _ needs to figure out what Noah’s up to.

/

Rosa finds him sitting at one of the tables, sipping champagne and charming the people around him. She eyes him where his jacket gapes open, hoping to catch a glimpse of the syringe containing a dose of Liz’s fake serum, but she has no luck. Instead, she sits across the table from him, glaring and muttering obscenities about him under her breath as she waits for him to make another move, or indicate in some way what he’s up to. She only looks away when his smile turns slightly smug and he toasts to someone across the way.

She looks to see who he’s toasting only to see her own father smiling over at them. “What?” she says, leaning back in her chair, brain shorting out for a second as her father smiles over at the man who killed her. “What?”

Absently, Rosa notices Isobel coming over to flirt with Noah, and his laughing response, but her eyes are still on her father and Liz. They’re talking, and her dad is still smiling, but Liz’s smile looks forced, less genuine. There’s a buzzing in her brain as she tries to remove the image of her dad and Noah trading friendly smiles. But she’s aware enough to notice when Liz’s gaze turns sharp, and her breath hitches when she sees Liz is exchanging meaningful looks with Max.

She stands up and walks around the table, stumbling her way down the steps towards Liz, who’s making her way to the edge of the dance floor to meet up with Max. She doesn’t blink at all as she steps around people on the dance floor, her eyes fixed on Liz and Max. She’s holding her breath, lips pressed together as she walks up to their table, not willing to make a sound; all the better to hear Max say, “It just doesn’t make sense. Noah’s like a human golden retriever. Fetch, sit, stay.”

Rosa half-sobs, her hands coming up to cover her mouth as she shakes her head. They’ve  _ somehow _ come up with Noah as a suspect, and she can feel herself shaking.

“I was at Grant Green’s warehouse because of him, the night Wyatt attacked,” Liz says, and Rosa bites her lip as she waits for Max’s thoughts.

“After that, he told me to stop investigating Wyatt,” Max tells her. “I thought he was protecting me, but...maybe it was a threat.”

“Oh my god,” Rosa whispers into her hands. “Oh my god.”

“Okay, okay,” Liz says, continuing the threat. “So he...incepted my barista to destroy my lab to get the last of my serum, collect the antidote. No, wait. He got shot.” She shakes her head, clearly doubtful because of that, and Rosa lets out another half-sob, shaking her head.

“It’s the perfect cover,” Max says.

Rosa closes her eyes and leans into him, breathing out a sigh of relief.

“I don’t know though,” Max continues. Rosa’s eyes pop open, glaring up at him as he says, “He just doesn’t seem that tough.”

Rosa steps away from him and shakes her head. “Looks can be very deceiving,” she whispers, looking over at Noah, happily spinning his wife around on the dance floor.

“You know, there’s a way to find out,” Max says, and Rosa freezes, looking up at him. He tilts his head toward the happy couple.

“No!” Rosa blurts, shaking her head at him. “Don’t, please. He’s so much stronger than you know. Don’t ask her to go in there alone with him!”

Max moves through Rosa toward the dance floor, smiling easily when he approaches Isobel and Noah to ask to cut in.

Rosa holds her breath for the extent of their argument, eyes tracking Noah on the edge of the dance floor as he smiles and laughs and mingles, glancing back to Isobel every few seconds.

“No,” Isobel is saying again. “I’m sorry, I promised him today that I would not use my powers.” Max clenches his jaw and Isobel’s eyes go blank for a second. “He made me promise,” she says, a little unsure.

“I need to get you out of here,” Max says, and Rosa nods in agreement. As much as she wants Noah to get caught, she doesn’t want to put someone else she cares about in danger for that to happen.

“No.” Isobel shakes her head. “I will get into his mind and I will prove to you that he is a good man, who deserves better than this.” She walks away from him, and Rosa goes with her. Even though she can’t actually enter Isobel’s mindspace to help her, she’s not going to leave her on her own as she tries to get into the head of a murderer.

/

She circles them on the dance floor, holding her breath as she watches their faces. An outsider would probably assume they were a couple deeply in love, unable to look away from each other but also so in tune with each other they don’t have to speak to be understood.

But Rosa’s right there. She watches the way Isobel’s eyes widen with shock, as Noah’s mild smile turns just a tad more feral. She hears the barely-discernible hitch in Isobel’s breath and the low growl from deep in Noah’s throat. “Isobel,” she says quietly, stepping up behind her to wrap her arms around her, mouth next to her ear. “Get out of there,  _ please _ .”

But it’s no use. When Isobel and Noah part, he’s still got an easy smile on his face, and she’s utterly calm as she makes her way back over to Max to tell him Noah’s not the fourth alien. She leaves him a moment later, and Rosa just can’t leave her alone again.

She follows Isobel as she makes her way through the empty exhibits, practically jogging to keep up with her pace as they make their way to the back door of the museum. “Isobel!” Rosa says, reaching out for her. “Isobel, come on, fight it! Fight him!”

They make it out the back door and into the alley, all while Rosa is screaming at Isobel to snap out of it, and that’s when Max catches up with them. 

“Isobel,” he calls out, running to catch her arm. “Hey. Look, now, you’re not you. I know my sister...and you’re not Isobel.” He’s moved to block her escape route down the alley.

Isobel’s entire body language melts from sophisticated, icy socialite to cocky, murderous mind-snatcher in a roll of her shoulders. “You’re never gonna let go of her, are you?” Noah asks, and then he swings out with Isobel’s fists to punch Max.

Rosa screams, looking down both ends of the alley for help, but there’s no one around. They’re all back inside.

She drops to the ground next to Max when Noah lays him out, hand hovering over his shoulders as she tries and fails to help him up. She glares up at Noah, and it’s so hard because he’s wearing Isobel’s face again. Now that she knows him, and now that she knows Isobel, it’s easy to tell the difference between Isobel Evans, and Noah when he’s using her body. The cruel curl of her lip, the way he cocks her head to the side like he’s looking at a bug rather than a human being. Rosa’s reminded all over again why she’d tried to distance herself from Isobel towards the end.

When Noah takes Max’s gun and aims it down at him, Rosa scrambles up, putting herself between the two of them. “No!” she yells, splaying her arms out wide to cover Max. “Noah, don’t!”

There’s the sound of a gunshot and Rosa screams, but whirls around when she realizes it came from behind them. Jenna Cameron, avenging angel, comes strolling out the back door of the museum saying, “Max won’t hurt you, but I will,” as she fires off another warning shot. Noah drops the gun and takes off down the alley.

Rosa sags to the ground next to Max, nearly crying with relief. When she sees Cameron helping Max up, she nods and stands up as well. “I need to go with her,” she says to them. “I can’t leave her alone with him.”

She takes off after Noah, pausing at the end of the alley to watch him slipping into the passenger side of his SUV. She slides into the back seat, behind Isobel’s still body, and sucks in a breath when she sees Liz crouching behind Noah--in his actual body--in the driver’s seat.

“Liz,” she breathes out, eyes darting to Noah, who is preoccupied with Isobel. “Lizzie, you need to get out of here,” she whispers.

Noah starts the car and Rosa waves frantically at her sister to run. Instead, Liz pops up behind him and shoves a syringe into his neck. Rosa screams, slamming her hands on the seat. “Liz, run!”

And this time, her sister follows her order. She takes off running down the street and Rosa bolts after her, her only thought being making sure Liz gets to safety. Halfway down the street Liz stops suddenly, as if she’s run into a wall, and Rosa looks over her shoulder as she keeps running and sees Noah standing outside of his car, eyes fixed on Liz.

“No!” Rosa yells, skidding to a stop and placing herself between Liz and Noah.

She can hear Liz behind her, held in place by Noah’s powers, scared whimpers escaping her as she struggles to move.

“Noah!” Rosa yells, holding her arms out to ward him off. Behind her, she hears Liz turning around.

“You just can’t walk away, can you?” he asks as he stalks up to her. He moves around behind her and Liz is powerless to stop him, or even turn to keep him away from her blind spot, but Rosa’s not. She tracks his every movement, careful to keep her spectral form between her sister and her murderer.

He uses his powers to turn Liz again, and Rosa snarls at his using his power for the pure pleasure of scaring her sister. “Noah, let her go!” she screams at him.

He moves closer, but Rosa backs up, flush against her sister as Liz screams, “Let go of me!”

Noah reaches forward, his hand disappearing through Rosa’s shoulder to land on Liz’s. “No!” she screams in tandem with her sister. She whirls around, watching in horror as Noah’s hand lights up, bright red over Liz’s shoulder and upper chest.

Liz screams in pain, and Rosa reaches up to cup her face, tears filling her eyes as she shakes her head, mouth open in a wordless scream. There’s a moment where she  _ knows _ she’s going to have to watch her sister die the way she did, and the horror she feels at that goes beyond anything she’s ever experienced before.

Then, Noah’s hand stops glowing.

There’s another moment where Rosa remembers not knowing she’d died, and only realizing she was dead after she’d seen her own body. Before that, she’d thought she’d survived, and her spirit or ghost or whatever it was had been standing right where her body had been a minute before. She looks at Liz, meets her eyes, and holds her breath as she waits for her sister to recognize her, waits for her confusion at seeing Rosa again. It’s only when she  _ doesn’t _ see that recognition in Liz’s eyes that she dares to look down, confirming there’s no body on the ground.

“Sucks to be powerless, doesn’t it?” Liz says to Noah, before she pushes his hand off of her with one hand and punches him square in the face with the other.

Ross lets out a strangled laugh, tears filling her eyes as she struggles to find her equilibrium after those two moments.

There’s a blur of black as Max runs up and tackles Noah to the ground, punching him repeatedly until he passes out.

But Rosa doesn’t pay much attention to that; her eyes are fixed on her sister, who just incapacitated, stood up to, and punched her murderer in the face. “Lizzie,” she says, voice wobbling, and then she bursts into tears, burying her face in her hands.


	12. Creep

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three days after Liz finally learned the truth about what happened to Rosa, Kyle stops by for a coffee while Liz is on shift. Rosa slips onto the stool next to him and leans forward to drop her forehead onto his shoulder. “I’ve missed you,” she breathes out. “So much.” She hadn’t wanted to leave Liz, after she’d almost died at the same hand that had killed her, but she has missed her brother so much.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rest is done. I just need to polish it up. You can expect it by the weekend!
> 
> Episode dialogue from transcripts.foreverdreaming.org.
> 
> Thanks to insidiousintent for the beta, and space-malex for Max's ringtone!

The handprint doesn’t appear until the morning after Liz confronts Noah. For the next few days, the only time Liz acknowledges it is in the mornings, when she inspects it to see if it’s fading. Other than that, Liz pretends she’s fine.

She mixes up more of the antidote and makes churro pancakes with their dad and starts taking shifts at the Crashdown again. Rosa almost never leaves her side, except to briefly check in on Isobel, who is doing about as well as could be expected, when one learns they fell in love with, and married a lying serial killer who repeatedly violated their body.

But Rosa’s priority is Liz, who spends hours at night staring up at the ceiling in their childhood bedroom, silent tears dripping down her face, typing out long text messages to Max and then deleting them before she sends them. 

Three days after Liz finally learned the truth about what happened to Rosa, Kyle stops by for a coffee while Liz is on shift. Rosa slips onto the stool next to him and leans forward to drop her forehead onto his shoulder. “I’ve missed you,” she breathes out. “So much.” She hadn’t wanted to leave Liz, after she’d almost died at the same hand that had killed  _ her _ , but she has missed her brother so much.

“I see the antenna’s back in play,” Kyle teases Liz, taking a sip of his coffee.

“Oh, it was the one thing missing from my angiogenic research,” Liz quips back.

“You are brilliant,” he says, leaning forward. “You’ll be back in a lab in no time.”

Rosa can already see a difference in her sister. “Bless you, Kyle Valenti.” She smiles over at him as she leans her arm on the counter.

Racist Hank briefly adds the title “Misogynist” to his name when he calls Liz “honey”, and she says to Kyle, “I have three degrees.”

Kyle smiles, trying to make her feel better. “And rocket relish on your collar,” he says, leaning across the counter to point it out. He tilts his head to the side and his smile fades as he catches a glimpse of Noah’s handprint. “Another handprint from Evans?” he asks, voice low, sounding pissed off on her behalf.

Rosa snorts and shakes her head. “What, you offended he’d leave a mark on her, like it’s a hickey or something?” She thinks about it and raises her eyebrows. “Now there’s a thought…”

Liz tells Kyle it’s from Noah and he expresses his continued disbelief that Noah was the alien serial killer.

Liz shrugs and says, “Noah is basically in alien jail forever, probably.” She takes a large breath. “Justice is served, and I got the answers I was looking for with my sister, so it’s done.”

Rosa scrunches up her nose and shakes her head. “You sure?”

“Yeah, you seem real well-adjusted,” Kyle says, just as much of a skeptic.

Liz pouts a little and amends it to say, “I’m working on the whole closure thing.”

There’s a pause before Kyle nods slowly and says, “Yeah, me too.”

Rosa feels a pang of guilt. She’d been so focused on Liz, who’d been physically hurt in the altercation with Noah, and Isobel, who’d just learned half of her life was basically a lie, that she’d forgotten other people would be reeling about the truth surrounding Rosa’s death.

She leans forward to put her hand on Kyle’s, just as he takes a breath and says to Liz, “Listen, uh, I’ve got some personal stuff going on today, but this weekend, I was thinking of visiting my dad’s grave, and I’d like to pay respects to Rosa, too.” Rosa’s brows come together and she bites her lip. Kyle asks, “You want to come?”

Liz smiles and reaches forward to squeeze his hands. “Yeah, that’d be nice. Thank you.” She leans back and says, “Rosa always liked you.”

Rosa bursts out laughing, shaking her head just as Kyle tilts his head and says, “Mm, no she didn’t.”

“But I love you now,” Rosa says, lifting her hand to cup his cheek.

Liz leaves to take care of Racist, Misogynist Hank and a few other patrons while Kyle finishes his coffee. When Liz comes back, he starts to pull out his wallet and she waves him off. “Free drinks for life, remember?”

He tilts his head, lips twitching, “I thought the deal was for fries?”

Liz leans over the counter and places her hands on his shoulders, shaking her head with a fake wince. “You already get those, so I had to amend the deal. Sorry for not consulting you first.”

Kyle rolls his eyes as he puts his wallet away, saying, “Wonder what I’d have to do for free burgers.”

Liz shrugs and starts wiping down the counter. “Guess we’ll have to see.”

Kyle huffs out a laugh and stands up. “I’ll call you tomorrow?”

Liz smiles at him again and nods, waving him off.

Rosa looks between the two of them, biting her lip. Finally, she turns to Liz and says, “It’s been days since I spent any time with him, so I’m going on whatever errand he’s running today. Will you be alright on your own?”

Liz finishes wiping down the counter, then uses the rag to wipe the rocket relish off her collar, snorting and shaking her head, a small smile quirking her lips. 

Rosa takes that as an affirmative and follows Kyle out to his car.

/

“Where are we going?” Rosa asks from the passenger seat, tilting her head to watch him as he drives. His music is turned down low, but his fingers tap along on the steering wheel, and Rosa shrugs, turning to watch out the windshield as they drive away from the center of town. As she starts noticing the general direction they’re headed and the turns Kyle’s signalling, her eyebrows shoot up. “Seriously?” she asks, looking over at him again. “Have you ever even been out here?” she asks as they pull into Sanders’. Even more surprising is Alex’s presence, standing a few feet away from Michael, where he sits in the back of his truck.

Rosa and Kyle exit his car, and Kyle says to the other two, “Who’s driving?”

Rosa shakes her head, lifting her shoulders and saying, “Where are you--”

Her mouth snaps shut when Michael scoots off the tailgate and throws his hand in Kyle’s direction. “This guy?” he says incredulously to Alex. “You want to take this guy to investigate potential aliens?”

Rosa’s mouth drops open. “Caulfield? You’re ready for that already?” she asks.

Kyle tilts his head to the side, looking surprised, and opens his mouth to respond, but Alex shakes his head and him and licks his lips. “Look, Guerin. He’s the one who led us to the Caulfield connection, and his family’s been involved in the project since the beginning. He’s coming with.” His tone is calm and even.

Rage swirls in Michael’s eyes as he looks over at Kyle and Rosa sighs heavily, rubbing her forehead. Finally, Michael makes his way over to Alex’s jeep and climbs into the back.

Alex lets out a slow breath and looks to Kyle. “Guess I’m driving,” he says lightly, before making his way to the driver’s seat. 

Kyle snorts and shakes his head, moving to the passenger seat.

Rosa climbs in next to Michael and checks the time on the jeep’s clock, calculating how long they have until they get to Caulfield. She has about an hour and a half until her brother walks into a hornet’s nest, and she has a few people she should check in on before she needs to return to watch her brother’s back.

“Why do both my siblings have to be big damn heroes all the time?” she mutters under her breath before she leaves the boys on their road trip to Caulfield.

/

She appears in the middle of a hangar somewhere that is most definitely not in Niger, though she doesn’t know exactly where she is. “Fuck!” she says, spinning around to pinpoint where Jesse Manes is lurking.

He’s nearby at a computer, reviewing the latest Project Shepherd reports as other military personnel go about their business around him. From what she can discern, they’re at a military base, though it’s not the one at which she’d seen him last, which is concerning. A look out the open hangar doors tells her he’s in a desert that could easily be located in New Mexico, and the position of the sun in the sky is definitely indicative of a North American location; it would be much later in the day in Niger.

“Fuck,” Rosa says again. “Looks like Jesse Manes has finally decided to make the next move.” She sighs and looks up at the ceiling. “This is such shit timing.”

/

She hasn’t seen Isobel since the night before, so she decides to check in on her before she heads back to Kyle, Alex, and Michael.

Isobel’s alone in the cave, staring at Noah in her pod. Rosa sighs and puts herself between the two of them, reaching out to run her hands down Isobel’s arms. “Hey. I know this is hard,” she says, breathing deep and tilting her head, smiling. “But you’re finally free of him, and that’s a good thing.”

Isobel’s face twists and she starts turning away, shivering. Rosa moves with her, running a hand down her back as she glares back at Noah.

His eyes pop open and Rosa jumps back, screaming. She looks over at Isobel and yells, “Did you know he could do that?”

Isobel backs away, eyes wide, and when Noah starts slamming on the side of the pod, his yells muffled by whatever’s in there, she gasps. Rosa shakes her head, breaths shaky as she keeps herself between Isobel and Noah.

“Max?” Isobel yells, and then Noah breaks out of the pod.

“What the fuck!” Rosa yells.

“How is it possible?” Isobel gasps as Max comes running in, pulling his gun on Noah.

“Great fucking question!” Rosa yells, stepping next to Isobel and placing her hand on her arm, wishing she could pull her further away.

Isobel steps in front of Noah instead, yelling, “No!”

“What?” Rosa yells, lunging after her. “What are you doing?”

“Is he making you do this?” Max asks.

“No!” Isobel says. “He has Liz’s serum in him. He can’t control me. It’s me.” But she’s still standing in front of Noah, protecting him, so Rosa pulls away from her. “Don’t kill him,” Isobel says. “We need answers.”

Max nods, reluctantly agreeing, but keeps his gun on Noah as he gets dressed. Max’s phone starts ringing in his pocket, a few lines from Brown-Eyed Girl echoing throughout the cave, but his gaze stays steadily on Noah. The ringing stops and starts up again almost right away.

“You gonna get that, Maximo?” Noah says roughly as he pulls on his jacket.

“Shut up,” Max growls, motioning him to precede them out of the cave. Max keeps Isobel behind himself as they make their way to his car, then gives her the keys to drive while he stays in the back with Noah, gun trained on him the whole way. His phone rings again as they’re getting into the car, but he continues to ignore it.

Rosa sits in the front passenger seat, twisting around to watch Noah as they drive, eyes narrowed on him as he tries to catch Isobel’s eye in the rearview mirror. Isobel keeps her eyes on the road, only jumping slightly when her own phone starts to ring from her back pocket. She shifts around to pull it out and says, “It’s Liz.”

Rosa’s eyebrows come together as she looks over at Isobel. “Answer it,” she says, just as Max says the same.

“Liz,” Isobel says, tone utterly calm. “Is there something I can help you with?”

Rosa can hear the muffled sounds of her sister through the tinny speaker of Isobel’s phone. “Something’s happened with Noah,” she says, voice high and frantic.

Isobel inhales sharply and nods. “We know. He broke out of the pod. We’re taking him back to Max’s now.”

They’re both silent for a moment before Liz says, voice less frantic, “I’m on my way.”

Isobel hangs up on her and throws her phone at Rosa, who scowls and bats it away, turning back to Noah. “Sounds like a party,” he says mildly.

“Shut up,” Max says again, teeth gritted, pointer finger shifting along the edge of his gun, twitching toward the trigger.

Noah doesn’t say anything for the rest of the drive.

Liz shows up at Max’s just after they do, bursting into the house, and Rosa runs over to her, leaning in as if to give her a hug. Her eyes are huge, her breathing fast, and Rosa makes a sound in her throat and shakes her head. “I thought you were done with him, at least for the time. I’m so sorry, Lizzie.”

Noah goes on to tell the story of the crash, talking about how they were refugees from a war-torn planet who crashed in Roswell because of a stowaway. Detailing the horrors he had to go through, listening to the rest of their people being slaughtered around him. Explaining how he’d escaped with his broken pod and hidden himself away before crawling back in to recover, only to realize he was cognizant in there, and trapped.

Rosa paces in front of him as he tells his story, arms crossed tightly over her chest as she shakes her head. She lunges for him when he talks about the night Isobel was attacked in the desert, wishing she could scratch his eyes out for viewing one of the most horrifying experiences of a young girl’s life as some kind of miracle.

Max looks like wants to do the same. “She was 14 years old,” he grits out, jaw clenching.

Isobel looks away from him, eyes filled with tears, and Rosa moves to sit next to her, hand hovering over her back.

“Max said you blacked out, after the assault,” Liz asks her to confirm.

Isobel places a hand over her mouth and says quietly, “That’s how he got in.” She turns back to Noah and says, voice stronger and full of derision, “You crawled in through some crack in my psyche?”

“Yes,” he says with a nod. “And I stayed. Through the years, every time you were triggered, every time you were afraid, you left your body, and gave me space to borrow it.”

Rosa leaps up again, fists clenched at her sides, and snarls, “Sick, motherfucking piece of shit!”

Max beats her to him, though, slamming his fist into Noah’s face and knocking him to the ground.

Rosa steps back and nods, exhaling sharply through her nose. “ _ Thank _ you,” she says to Max as she stares down at Noah, unconscious on the ground.

“I need air,” Isobel says, bolting for the door.

Rosa closes her eyes and breathes deep, shaking her head and kicking Noah once in the stomach before she turns around and goes after her.

/

Isobel stalks out into the desert, long legs eating up the ground, and Rosa has to run to catch up to her. “Is, slow down!” she calls, skidding to a stop and scrambling to turn around when Isobel abruptly changes directions to start pacing. 

Isobel’s breath comes in pants, rough and shaky as she takes long strides in a large oval. Rosa perches on a rock nearby, elbows on knees, chin in hand as she watches her closely.

Finally, Isobel takes her phone out of her pocket and scrolls, bringing it up to her ear as she stops in the middle of her pacing to close her eyes and raise her face to the sky. She’s calling Michael, Rosa knows. He’s the only other person besides Max she’d want to talk to at a time like this.

Evidently he doesn’t answer; too loud in the jeep, perhaps, though Rosa knows her allotted ‘away’ time is rapidly dwindling and they could be nearing Caulfield, which is a dead zone. Isobel sighs loudly, ending the call and dialing again, pacing over to the rock Rosa is perched on; Rosa has to jump up to avoid being sat on as Isobel starts talking. “Noah’s out of the pod,” she starts with, sitting down heavily. “He got out, somehow, so we took him to Max’s. He…” She lets out a shaky breath and swallows hard. Rosa kneels at her feet, placing her hands on Isobel’s knees. “Spewed some bullshit about us not being enemies. Said he and I were…” she shivers and clears her throat. “Connected.” There’s a long pause, then Isobel’s eyes flicker up behind Rosa, and she turns to see her sister on her way over. “Anyway, there’s not much time, so...you better get here soon, if you want to ask your questions.”

Rosa stands as Liz nears, then moves to sit next to Isobel on the rock. “Michael’s not answering,” Isobel says.

“I’m sure he’s okay,” Liz says quietly.

“Yeah, of course he’s fine,” Isobel snaps. “The villain is slowly dying on my brother’s couch.”

“It’s okay to grieve,” Liz says, voice even, like she knows Isobel’s game. “It’s okay to miss the version of him that you loved.”

“What great disappointment of yours do you want me to relate to right now, Liz?” Isobel asks, voice dripping with scorn. “Your mother, who was never there to cut the crusts off your sandwiches? Or Rosa, who didn’t have it all figured out at nineteen?”

Rosa sighs, dropping her head into her hands. Isobel is like Alex that way--tear out the other person’s throat before they have a chance to do it to you. “Let her help you, Is,” she whispers. “She could be such a good sister to you.”

Luckily, Liz seems to know this about her because she shakes her head and says, “I won’t pretend to know what you’re going through.”

Isobel closes her eyes and nods. Rosa runs her hand down her back.

Liz continues, “I mean, you were violated in a way that’s…” She shakes her head. “Unimaginable.” She steps closer; not enough to crowd, but to show Isobel she stands with her, and Rosa smiles. “It doesn’t matter what Michael needs to know from him, and it doesn’t matter how angry Max is. What do  _ you _ need?”

Isobel’s shoulders have dropped, and her face has softened. There’s not a trace of venom in her voice when she says, “I’ve never lost someone that I loved.” She tries looking up at Liz, but can’t quite meet her eyes as she continues, “Was there anything that made you feel better, about Rosa?” She meets Liz’s eyes then, and Rosa drops her forehead onto Isobel’s shoulder.

A second later, she has to leap up again to avoid being sat on by Liz. “The truth helped,” Liz tells Isobel after she sits down next to her.

They’re all quiet for a long time as Isobel thinks it over. Finally, she swallows and says, “I think I need answers about why he did…” She sucks in a breath and tilts her head. “What he did to me.”

Liz nods once and says, “Is that it?”

They stare into each others’ eyes for a long moment before Isobel nods and says, “Yes. Then I think I could let him die, for everything he did.”

Liz inhales sharply through her nose and says, “Okay.” Her expression is unreadable.

“Okay,” Rosa says. She looks down at Isobel’s phone to check the time and says, “I’ll be back for the finale, then.”

And she heads back to Caulfield to watch over her brother.

/

They’re already inside the prison, though it’s in an abandoned section. “Fuck,” Rosa whispers, following behind them. “You guys made great time.”

Michael unlocks a door and they all step through. “I feel them,” he says.

Rosa’s eyebrows go up. “Seriously? It’s not just you and Max and Is?”

“Come on, this way,” Michael says to Alex and Kyle, making his way to the next hallway. Alex follows, holding out a tablet, and Kyle brings up the rear with Rosa.

The boys move quickly, which has Rosa cocking her head. “You know this base is occupied, right?” She’s been preoccupied with Liz and Isobel the last few days, but she assumed Alex had finished collecting information on Caulfield, including the fact that it was still a running base for Project Shepherd. Alex wouldn’t have brought them if he didn’t have a smart plan for dealing with other members of this farce of an operation, but rushing through the base seems… uncharacteristically unsafe.

They stop in front of a door and Michael narrows his eyes on it. He huffs out a breath, face relaxing, then tries again.

“Why can’t you Magneto your way through this one?” Kyle asks.

Michale turns to him, eyes narrowed, and says, “I don’t know.”

Alex’s tablet beeps and Rosa looks over at him as he says, “Wait, someone’s coming.” He turns around to orient himself compared to the person on his tablet and tells Kyle and Michael, “I’ll take care of this. Head towards the entrance.”

Kyle starts walking that way, but Michael is not so willing to leave Alex. “No,” he says, face incredulous.

“Go!” Alex orders, not willing to argue about it, and the tone seems to startle Michael into complying.

Rosa runs after Kyle and Michael, yelling, “Don’t get killed, babe!” over her shoulder as she goes, confident in the fact that Michael and Kyle need her supervision much more than Alex does.

They do head in the right general direction for the entrance, but take a few wrong turns as they go. That’s when Rosa realizes: she and Kyle are following Michael, who is  _ not _ complying with Alex’s order. He’s following his senses to the other aliens.

Her eyes widen when she starts recognizing hallways and staircases that are closer to the alien cages, turning around to keep an eye on the boys’ backs as they make their way closer.

“Are we just following alien radar?” Kyle asks after a while, as they’re making their way up a set of stairs right down the hall from the aliens.

“Feel free to leave me alone,” Michael shoots back.

“Hey!  _ Your _ ship crashed into  _ my _ family in ‘47,” Kyle says. “My father’s dead, and I think the reason for it is somewhere here inside these walls. You’re not the only one who wants answers,” he explains as they get to the top of the stairs.

Rosa slips between them to stand in front of the door that will lead them to the aliens, willing one of them to look in her direction instead of continuing in their macho staredown. She waves her hands around, calling their names, and Kyle looks in her direction when he breaks eye contact with Michael.

His eyes narrow and he pulls out his phone. “Alex and I decoded my dad’s letters,” he says, tilting the screen to show Michael. “Look. This repeats. 7A-N38.”

Rosa lets out a long breath and nods, leaning back against the door. “And you’re almost there.”

Michael barely glances down at the phone, more focused on Kyle. “Alex and  _ you _ , huh?”

Rosa narrows her eyes on him and says, “Don’t, Guerin. You don’t get to be jealous when you’re more than ready to move on with Alex’s  _ best friend _ .” She closes her eyes and breathes deep, pushing her anger away before opening her eyes again and says, “We’ve got more important things to deal with right now, anyways.” And she follows them through the door, down to the cell block full of alien prisoners.

They make their way down the stairs slowly, Rosa bringing up the rear. She doesn’t want to be here, will remember the atrocities committed against these people by Jesse Manes for the rest of her life. Will never forget watching her father stand idly by as some of those atrocities were committed.

But her brother’s here, and as long as he’s in danger, she’s not going to leave him. She trails behind him as he glances into the cells, placing her hand in the center of his back in comfort when he jumps away from one of the cells, startled by the alien within.

“He’s an alien,” Michael murmurs, looking in at the old man, then shifting to look in at the others. “They all are. I can feel them.” Rosa brushes past her brother to reach a hand out and lay it on Michael’s arm. “They’re angry. Confused, frightened.” His breathing is coming faster as his heads whips from side to side to he can look into all of the cells.

“If they’re survivors of the 1947 crash…” Kyle says, eyes focused on Michael. “They’ve been in captivity for 71 years.”

Michael whips around and yells, “Will you just shut up, Valenti? These people, they’re like me!”

Rosa has to leave her brother at that, running up to Michael and placing her hands on his shoulders. She drops her head onto his chest, wishing there was something she could do to comfort him. There are very few things that can rattle Michael enough that he can’t keep up his detached facade, but the threat of being captured and experimented on is high on his list.

Michael’s paralyzed, eyes flicking from one cell to the next as his breathing comes short and fast. “Michael,” Rosa murmurs into his chest. She turns her head to look over at Kyle.

He’s stepped closer to one of the cells, doing a visual assessment of the alien within. “Their bodies are covered in bruises, scarring, needle tracks.” He glances at a few of the others from afar. “Antisocial behavior indicates prolonged trauma.”

Rosa exhales shakily and hides her face in Michael’s chest again. He grits his teeth and says, “Seven decades of torture.” He sucks in a breath and turns away from Rosa, to Kyle. “We gotta get them out of here.”

“Bring them where?” Kyle asks, and Rosa inhales sharply. His tone is apologetic when he says, “They’re feral.” His eyes are aimed at the floor, shoulders rounded in shame. 

Michael doesn’t refute it, which means he must know Kyle’s right. Rosa shakes her head, brow furrowed as she shrugs. “I know, but…” She sighs and buries her face in her hands. “God, I thought the worst thing I’d ever have to witness had already passed, but this…” She shakes her head. “This is like grasping hope in your hands, only to have it ripped away, leaving you more bloody and wounded than before.”

Kyle starts looking around again, saying, “My dad wanted me to find subject N-38. It’s all over the letters.”

Rosa drops to the floor, suddenly utterly exhausted, and says, “Yeah. That’s the one Manes pushed him in with, and then he got the tumor.”

“Hey,” Kyle says. “Guerin.”

Rosa turns to look up at Michael, who’s faced away from her, looking into one of the cells. The alien inside sits up quickly when she sees him. “Oh, no,” he says, creeping closer. “Oh, I know her.”

Rosa scrambles up, sliding up next to him. “I thought you didn’t remember anything before the pods?” The woman on the other side of the glass is slowly standing up, shock on her face.

“I-I know, I know, I know her,” Michael says, and Rosa’s chest aches at the confusion in his voice. He sounds like a little kid.

“Are you sure?” Kyle asks, looking between them.

A door opens from down the way, and Rosa gasps, reaching out for Michael’s shoulder, trying to pull him away just as Kyle pushes him in the same direction. “Someone’s coming. Go, go, go.”

They push him into an empty cell and Rosa stays in the doorway to watch over him while Kyle talks to the guard on rotation. Michael’s utterly still, eyes unfocused as he bites his lip, hard. “How do you know her?” Rosa whispers, dread filling her whole chest.

She tunes back into the conversation Kyle is having with the guard in time to hear her say, “There’s been a strict ban on any interaction with Subject N-38 since 1962.”

Kyle apologizes for the mix-up, and his awful undercover skills put Rosa on edge. The woman has a gun, and her brother would be useless in a fight against an experienced fighter. Still, she doesn’t seem to catch on that Kyle doesn’t actually belong there while he fishes for information about the man in cell N-38.

“Everything it touches dies of violent, rapid cancer,” she says. “It could have a tumor to a brick wall.”

Rosa checks that Michael’s staying put, then walks over to Kyle as he swallows hard and asks the guard, “Any human ever go in there?”

“Once,” she confirms.

Rosa stands behind him, hands on his back as he shakes, bullshitting his way through the rest of the interaction with the guard. Once she leaves, he takes half a minute to breathe slowly, eyes welling with tears before he wipes them away and goes to pull Michael out of his hiding place.

“I’m gonna go find Alex,” he tells him. Michael’s gaze has already been drawn back to the woman in the cell, and Kyle nods. “We’ll come find you in a bit if you haven’t found us.”

Michael nods, not speaking.

Rosa runs a hand down Michael’s arm before she follows Kyle up the stairs and out to find Alex.

/

They race toward the last place they saw Alex, following the sound of his voice as it echoes around the cement walls of the prison.

“Alex,” Kyle calls out once they’re close enough to hear him clearly. He precedes Rosa into the room and she stops in the doorway.

“You brought Kyle Valenti with you,” Flint Manes says, incredulous.

Rosa rolls her eyes and grimaces over at him. “So good to see you, too, Flint.”

Kyle ignores him to talk to Alex. “I think I figured it out.” His voice gets higher, more frantic as he explains, “Look, this place is a  _ nightmare _ . Guantánamo for innocent people, and  _ our _ fathers facilitated it. Aliens have been tortured here for  _ decades _ .”

Rosa looks at the floor, biting her lip.

Flint scoffs and says, “They told you about Subject N-38.”

Rosa exhales heavily and looks over at Alex as he says, “Don’t tell me there’s an alien that can cause a brain tumor.”

“They’re all killers,” Flint says.

Rosa snarls and walks up to him, leaning up on her toes to get into his face. “Not all of them, and you think that justifies imprisoning them all? Torturing them and experimenting on them?”

“My dad participated in that research?” Kyle asks slowly. “Kept aliens isolated? Starved, dissected?” Flint nods imperceptibly and Kyle finishes with, “Then he deserved it.” His voice breaks as he says it, but his tone is firm, offering no excuses.

Rosa’s breath hitches and she buries her face in her hands. She knows her brother is right, but it’s been almost ten years since she found out about Caulfield, and she still has trouble reconciling the man who helped Jesse Manes hold innocents prisoner and the man who took care of her when she was trying to get clean.

She jumps a moment later when alarms start blaring around her, eyes skittering between Flint, Alex, and Kyle.

“What the hell?” Kyle asks.

“Quarantine breach,” Flint says. “We have ten minutes to get out of this building before it turns to dust. That would be your cue to leave.” He pushes Alex and Kyle toward the door as he turns back to collect some of his work before he leaves.

“Michael,” Rosa gasps out, head whipping to the door, then back to Alex and Kyle.

“What do we do?” Kyle asks, eyes wide.

Alex whips off his backpack and shoves it at Kyle. “Look, just grab everything that you can, okay? Hard drives, anything, but make sure that you get out.”

Kyle’s already nodding, “Okay.” He takes the bag and tells Alex where to find Michael, and Alex takes off after him.

Rosa hovers next to Kyle as he fills the bag with pieces of technology from the room, urging him to hurry.

The quarantine countdown hits five minutes and she places her hands over his, yelling, “Okay, you’re good, now get out!”

But he doesn’t stop. He keeps gathering more, and the countdown hits four minutes.

“Kyle!” she yells, slamming her hands down on the table next to him. “Get the fuck out of here!”

Three minutes, and he’s still filling the backpack. “God damn it, you stubborn fuck! Leave!”

Rosa’s counting the seconds under her breath, and it’s not until they’re almost at two minutes that Kyle finally zips up the backpack and starts heading for the door. “Thank fuck!” Rosa screams, urginging him toward the door as she runs behind him.

He nears the front door of the building just as the two minute warning blares, and she leaves him to make sure Alex and Michael are safe too.

/

They’re not out yet. They’re still down with the other aliens, having some kind of argument, apparently.

Michael’s holding a fire extinguisher, eyes filled with tears, and Alex is a few feet away, face totally panicked.

“What?” Michael asks him. “No.” He steps closer to Alex, shaking his head. “You gotta go, Alex!”

Alex squares his shoulders, grits his teeth, and says, “I don’t look away, Guerin.”

Rosa stands between them, reaching out for both, and yells, “Have this conversation later! Evacuate now!” She grabs for the edges of their shirts, but they slip through her fingers.

“No,” Michael says, and then he whispers it again. “Go! Go! I don’t love you!”

Rosa looks over to Alex, eyes wide, and sees the way he lets out a silent sob at Michael’s declaration.

“I don’t!” Michael continues, pointing to the stairs, as if Alex would ever leave him. “We’ve been holding onto this  _ thing _ ,” he yells, gesturing between them. “And what? It’s gotten us nowhere.” He takes a slow breath, and face crumpling, says quietly, “Just let it go.”

Alex’s eyes overflow with tears as he maintains eye contact with Michael and says, “You’re a miserable liar.”

Michael swallows hard, only breaking eye contact when the woman in the cell behind him somehow grabs his attention, her palm red against the glass. He’s a zombie as he walks over and places his hand directly over hers, only the glass separating them. Rosa steps in front of Alex as he watches them and places her hands on his face. “Alex, get him out of here. Drag him kicking and screaming if you have to, but you have to get out of here  _ now _ .”

She looks over her shoulder as Michael gasps and starts turning back to them, right as the one minute warning sounds throughout the prison. “Alex!” she yells, bunching her fists and hitting him in the chest. “Get out of here!”

But he’s not listening to her. Michael staggers toward them, eyes wide, gripping Alex’s sleeves as he stutters, “She’s my m...she’s my m…”

Rosa sucks in a breath and tears spring to her eyes as she looks over at the woman. “No,” she whispers. “No.” She presses her hands over her mouth as she holds her breath, shaking her head as she waits to see what Michael’s decision will be after learning who the woman is.

“Your mother?” Alex asks, gripping Michael to keep him upright. Michael leans into him, nodding, and their foreheads touch. “Did she speak? Did she say anything?” Alex asks.

“No. No. No,” Michael repeats; an answer to the question, but also a clear denial of what he’s going to have to do now, even knowing who she is. “But she said...she said she loves me,” he continues, opening his eyes. “And she said to run.”

Rosa sobs in relief and runs over to the glass, pushing her hand through to press against the woman’s face in thanks. She takes a long look at the woman, whose face is filled with utter relief as she watches Alex and Michael bolt up the stairs, and then Rosa runs after them.

They get to the door as the final seconds count down, and her brother is still there, hovering just inside the front door until he sees them. “What the fuck!” she yells at him as they all run out. “Did you come back for them like a fucking moron instead of getting yourself to safety? You stupid--” The four of them duck behind an abandoned vehicle outside the prison as the whole building goes up in flames, collapsing in front of them.

/

Alex has to guide Michael back to the jeep. His eyes are wide, unblinking, and Alex takes his hand and presses gently at the small of his back to get him moving. Rosa sits next to him in the back again, hands clenched into fists on her lap, tears streaming down her face as she watches him for the first fifteen minutes of the drive.

He’s utterly silent, as are Alex and Kyle, though the two of them keep shooting Michael glances in the rearview mirror. Michael’s eyes are glassy, empty, and it makes Rosa cry all the harder.

Half an hour after they leave, Michael opens his mouth and says something, but it’s too loud in the back of the jeep for anyone to hear him, including her. Still, Alex is keeping enough of an eye on him that he realizes Michael’s saying something, so he slows down and says, “What did you say?”

Michael’s mouth moves again and Rosa leans in closer. Finally, he says, loudly but hoarsely, “Take me to the turquoise mines.”

Alex and Kyle exchange another quick look and Alex clears his throat. “Guerin, are you sure you want to go there by yourself right now?”

Michael swallows and nods once, turning to look out the window. “Just take me to the mines, Manes.”

Rosa sees the way Alex’s shoulders stiffen at that, but he nods his agreement and softly says, “Okay.”

/

Michael is fraying at the edges, and Rosa can’t watch it anymore. She’s devastated for him, but she can’t allow herself to buckle under that feeling just yet. She wants to be in the angry stage of grief, because it’s easier.

She wants to watch her murderer die.

He’s handcuffed to a chair in Max’s guest room, bloody and sweaty and deteriorating by the second. Max is pacing the hallway, but she plants herself on the floor right in front of Noah, crossing her legs and leaning back on her hands, a picture of ease. “It’s been a shitty day,” she tells him, voice rough. “But watching you die is going to make it so much better. I can’t have triple chocolate ice cream, but I can have this.”

She tilts her head to the side studying him. She remembers when she found out he was the one who’d killed her, not Isobel. She remembers the rage and the hatred and the shame of realizing she’d spent almost two years hating the wrong people. She remembers watching him worm his way into Isobel’s heart, then Michael’s, and even Max’s to an extent, all while hiding his true nature from all of them.

She remembers the only time she’d been present when he’d killed someone--a young immigrant who’d come to America for the chance to start over, to live a better life. He’d died alone and scared, his body left out in the desert, then unclaimed in the morgue. 

Rosa lets the rage fill her again, burning away the grief she feels for Michael. “You deserve this,” she whispers up to Noah. She notices the faint mark of hand-shaped bruises on his neck and looks over at Max. “I see someone else had to check their rage.” She turns back to Noah but calls out, “No need to kill him quickly, Max. Slow and painful is good for me.”

He’s deteriorating quickly, and Rosa sits and watches it happen, letting the fire of hatred simmer in her chest as she watches every gasping breath, every rough cough.

A while later, after it’s gone dark, Max comes in, dragging a chair, and drops it right where Rosa’s been sitting. She stands up and sits on the arm of the chair as he sits down. “Any last words?” he asks Noah. “Some people like to repent before they die.”

Rosa snorts and crosses her arms over her chest. “Repent? Yeah, right.” She lets out a long breath and shakes her head. “Wouldn’t do him any good to ask for forgiveness anyway, because I would never grant it.”

“Repent?” Noah asks on a rough laugh. “To who? God? You, Maximo?” he mocks, leaning forward.

Max laughs and stands up, turning to leave.

“Don’t!” Noah calls out. “Don’t leave me to die alone, Max.”

Rosa sighs and slips into Max’s chair, leaning forward with her elbows on her knees. “Don’t worry, you won’t be alone. I’ll be here, watching you die, and revelling in every second of it.”

/

Max leaves the room a minute later, but she hears him start talking to someone, voice soft, so she gets up with a huff and leaves to figure out what’s going on.

Michael’s just walked in, and he says, “Where’s Noah? I, uh...I went to the cave. He wasn’t in the pod.” His voice is uneven.

Rosa sighs and steps past Max toward Michael, reaching up to cup his cheek. “Mikey,” she whispers, as Max explains that Noah’s about to die.

Michael exhales shakily and starts to move past him, but Max grabs his arm and says, “Hey, hey. You need to talk to me. What happened?”

Rosa stands between them, a hand on each of their arms, and bows her head. “It’s been a bad day for everyone.”

“I don’t want to talk to you,” Michael states. “I want to talk to him. We  _ need _ to get him the antidote.”

Rosa sucks in a breath and steps back, shaking her head. “No.”

“That’s not gonna happen,” Max agrees. “This is the end of Noah’s story, right now. Okay?”

Rosa starts to let out a relieved breath, but it turns to a gasp when Michael punches Max, knocking him to the floor. “Michael!” she yells, leaning down to check on Max.

“I’m not letting another alien die,” he says.

“You have to!” Rosa yells up at him. She stands and walks up to him, setting her hands on his shoulders. “He is a  _ murderer _ , and a  _ rapist _ , and a  _ user _ . He has to die.”

Michael shakes his head and uses his telekinesis to draw the syringe of antidote that had fallen from Max’s hand into his. “Not until I get some answers,” he continues. “Not until I know the truth.” He turns away and starts heading for the back room.

Max rolls to his feet, drawing his gun as he goes, and Rosa shakes her head, standing in front of the barrel. “No,” she says. “This isn’t…” Her breath stutters and she shakes her head again. “No!”

Michael hears the click of the gun and slowly turns back around. “This is how it’s gonna go, Max?” he asks. Rosa can see the rage simmering in his eyes, and she gasps at how quickly this situation has turned potentially deadly for the wrong people.

“No! It’s not!” Rosa shouts, standing between them, a hand outstretched in each direction. “That’s not how this is going to go, because you’re not going to hurt each other over Noah!” She looks over at Michael. “He’s a psychopath who needs to die. Please,” she begs, licking her lips. “Please just let him.”

She turns back to Max, expression begging him to help Michael understand why Noah can’t live, but Michael’s not going to listen when there’s a gun pointed at him, and Max’s gun doesn’t waver. “That all depends on what you do next,” he says.


	13. Recovering the Satellites

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Listen to me, Michael,” Max says, gun still trained on his brother. “There is nothing Noah has to say that is worth keeping him alive.”
> 
> Rosa nods, holding her breath as she looks over at Michael. She releases it in a single, hysterical sob when she sees he’s still not listening to Max’s reasoning.
> 
> “I had a family, Max,” he says, voice trembling. “I had a mother. I saw her.”
> 
> Rosa chokes on another sob, shaking her head and stepping toward him, reaching up to skim her fingers over his face. “Michael…”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As always, thanks to insidiousintent for agreeing to beta the entire second half of this fic. Your feedback has been invaluable (especially your advice on where to end it... You're right: it is more dramatic this way.)
> 
> Episode dialogue from transcripts.foreverdreaming.org.
> 
> With that, I give you the finale of the longest fic I have ever written...

“Listen to me, Michael,” Max says, gun still trained on his brother. “There is nothing Noah has to say that is worth keeping him alive.”

Rosa nods, holding her breath as she looks over at Michael. She releases it in a single, hysterical sob when she sees he’s still not listening to Max’s reasoning.

“I had a family, Max,” he says, voice trembling. “I had a mother. I saw her.”

Rosa chokes on another sob, shaking her head and stepping toward him, reaching up to skim her fingers over his face. “Michael…”

Michael continues, “She’s been a few miles away our whole lives at some prison called Caulfield being tortured, and we never knew.”

“What? How…” Max starts.

The shock in his tone is enough to drag Rosa’s attention back to him. “No!” she says loudly. “Don’t rethink this, Max. Noah needs to die.  _ Please _ .”

“There are survivors from the 1947 crash,” Michael explains. His excitement turns to grief and a bit of rage again on a dime as he continues, “There  _ were _ survivors. They all just got flambéed on the order of  _ Alex Manes _ ’ father.” Rosa holds her breath, waiting for him to break down, but he continues, saying, “Listen, if there’s any chance Noah knows anything about this, we… we have to take that chance.”

Rosa’s shaking her head again, opening her mouth to argue with him, but Max beats her to it. “Think about what he did to Isobel. Whatever you saw out there, I am  _ so _ sorry, but Noah is  _ not _ the answer you’re looking for.”

Rosa lets out a relieved breath and nods.

Michael shakes his head, tears in his eyes. “No, he’s not,” he says, and then he breaks. “My… my mom was.”

Rosa shakes her head, slipping her arms around him as she cries with him. “I’m sorry, Michael,” she whispers into his chest. He continues to cry while he tries to convince Max they can both take Noah if they work together, begging Max to let him give Noah the antidote. Rosa pulls away, looking up into his desperate eyes, chest aching for him. “No, you can’t. He’s too dangerous, Michael. You’re…” She sighs and shrugs. “You’re not thinking clearly about how bad it would be if something went wrong and he escaped.” She wraps her hand around his wrist, willing him to drop the syringe.

“It’s too risky,” Max grits out, raising his gun again. As relieved as Rosa is that he’s in agreement with her about Noah dying, it still makes her anxious to see him aiming at gun at Michael, so she turns to face him as he continues, “We are  _ minutes _ away from this guy being a bad memory.”

Rosa reaches toward him, eyes trained on his gun, while Michael lets out a low chuckle behind her and says, “You’re not gonna shoot me.” Rosa lets out a doubtful noise; Max wasn’t pointing his gun at Michael for funsies.

She screams when Max shoots, whirling around with wide eyes to check on Michael, exhaling sharply when she sees the broken syringe in his hand. She whirls back to Max, stalking toward him and lifting her hand to slap it through his face. “Idiot!” she yells up into his shame-filled eyes. “You could have hurt him!”

“He’s the only chance we have to know about our family!” Michael yells desperately from behind her.

“I know my family,” Max says, voice firm, and Rosa steps away from him, crossing her arms over her chest and scowling up at him. “ _ You _ are my family. I am...so sorry, but I  _ need _ him dead.”

Rosa’s breath hitches and her hands rise to cover her face, as Michael yells, “I don’t care what you need!” and uses his telekinesis to shove Max backward, through his side door and out into the yard.

“Max!” she yells, running through the broken pieces of his door to kneel at his side. He’s passed out cold, and she’s unable to see if he’s wounded from hitting the tiles on the patio. “Fuck,” she whispers, moving around to see if she can get a better angle to see the back of his head, but it’s just too dark. She stands up and runs back into the house yelling for Michael, but he’s already on his way out of the back room with Noah. “No!” she yells, rushing forward, hands outstretched as if she could really stop them.

Michael’s behind Noah, gun trained on his back as he pushes him forward, asking about where his stash of Liz’s antidote is. Noah trips to the ground, splayed out on his back with his eyes closed, and Rosa holds her breath, praying he’s finally dead. She notices his hand reaching out for the broken syringe and sucks in a breath, dropping down next to him and reaching for his arm as he swings up, jamming the sharp edge of glass into Michael’s neck.

“No!” she yells, twisting to kneel over Michael as he gasps, hand held over the wound in his neck as he convulses on the ground. “Michael!” She places her hand over his, tears falling as she tries in vain to help him stop the flow of blood. 

She looks over her shoulder for Max, the only person capable of saving him, but he’s still out cold on the patio. She watches Noah step over his body as he takes off into the desert. “Fuck!” she yells. She looks back down at Michael, whose eyes are glassy and half-closed, his hand dropping away from his neck and allowing more blood to flow out onto the tile floor.

“Fuck!” she yells again, tears streaming down her face as she leaves to find the only other person who would even be aware that something’s wrong: Isobel.

/

Isobel’s already getting into her car, brow furrowed, muttering Max’s name under her breath.

Rosa lets out a slow breath and watches over her from the passenger seat. Isobel’s knuckles are white and her fingers clench the steering wheel rhythmically as she makes her way over to Max’s.

When they’re halfway to Max’s Rosa glances at the clock and inhales sharply. It’s been maybe ten minutes since everything went down. Ten minutes since Max was knocked out. Ten minutes since Noah stabbed Michael in the neck with the broken syringe. Ten minutes since Noah escaped, dying and in desperate need of Liz’s antidote.

A lot can happen in ten minutes.

“I need to go make sure my sister’s okay,” she murmurs, glancing up at Isobel. “I’ll catch up with you once I know she’s safe.”

/

Liz is just entering the Crashdown, phone to her ear. “Max, hey,” she says, and Rosa’s gaze, which had been sweeping the street behind Liz, snaps over to her. “I wanted to see if it’s done,” Liz continues, closing and locking the door behind her. “Uh, the handprint faded. I can’t feel him anymore. Thought you might want to know.” She stops in front of the jukebox to put in a quarter and Rosa stands next to her, running her hand down her sister’s back as she finishes leaving her message. “I’m coming back to your place. I’ll bring food and...milkshakes.”

Rosa nods and lets out a slow breath. “Good. Max and Michael will be up again soon, hopefully. You’ll be safer together.”

Liz goes back into the kitchen and Rosa starts pacing in front of the door. As soon as she sees the lock twist to unlock, she yells, “Liz!” and starts backing toward her.

Noah slips quietly in, pale and sweaty, but obviously very capable of using his powers again. He makes his way slowly around the counter, and Rosa holds her breath, keeping herself between him and Liz, who’s back digging some ice cream out of the freezer. He leans up against the window from the kitchen to the front counter and rings the bell.

“We’re closed!” Liz calls out, not even turning around.

“Liz!” Rosa yells again, but her sister’s already turning around. She freezes at the sight of Noah.

“How about a cherry cola?” he asks, slowly grinning at her.

Liz is frozen for a second, eyes wide as she watches his smile fade and he makes his way back into the kitchen. Then she slowly steps out of the freezer. Rosa stays in front of her, unblinking as she watches Noah move closer to her sister.

The knife on the counter next to them slides closer to him and he places his hand on it. She hears Liz gasp behind her. “Noah,” Rosa says, voice low. “If you hurt her--”

“You look like her,” he says to Liz, his gaze drawn to the memorial their father had put up for Rosa after she’d died. “But you’re nothing like Rosa. She’s hope and fire. I felt you through the handprint. You’re jaded, and so guilty...” He reaches out to touch her picture and Rosa snarls at him, glancing back to make sure Liz is still safe behind her. She’s crying, but she takes the opportunity his distraction affords and spins around, closing and blocking herself into the freezer, away from him.

“Oh thank god,” Rosa says, backing in after her. She watches Noah’s shadow through the small window on the door to the freezer, only turning back when she hears Liz make a small sound of triumph, followed by the sound of breaking glass. On the floor at their feet, there’s a small amount of the yellow pollen scattered about.

A minute later, the broom Liz had used to block the door slides out of place, allowing Noah to open the freezer door. “Thought you were the smart sister,” he says, and then he rushes forward, hand outstretched.

“No!” Rosa shouts, hands uselessly pulling at his arm as he tries to press his hand to Liz’s chest again.

Liz yells, trying to keep his hand from making contact, finally gaining enough leverage to kick him away, giving her enough time to slip past him and out of the freezer, this time locking  _ him _ in.

Rosa backs out through the door a moment after Noah looks up and sees the yellow powder on the floor of the freezer.

Liz picks up the knife on the counter and starts pacing the kitchen, breaths coming in short gasps as she keeps glancing back to the freezer, mumbling under her breath in Spanish.

Rosa keeps pace with her, eyes fixed on the freezer door, always keeping her body between Noah and Liz.

A minute later, Liz’s phone rings and she yelps, jumping up and closing her eyes as she lets out a slow breath. She shakes her head and answers after another ring, “Max.”

Rosa breathes out a sigh of relief. “Thank god.”

Liz tells Max that Noah’s trapped in the freezer at the Crashdown, dosed with a little bit of the pollen.

Noah slams on the window in the freezer door, yelling, “This won’t end well for you! You just put a lion in a paper cage!”

Rosa bites her lip and shakes her head. “How long until they get here?” she asks Liz.

“I’m not leaving,” Liz says into the phone, shaking her head. “If he gets out, we need to stop him before he kills someone.”

Rosa pauses, briefly considering if it might be a good idea for Liz to leave Noah here and get somewhere safe, but then he yells, “What are you gonna do when your imbecile father comes down for breakfast in the morning, huh? I’ll fry him like bacon.”

Rosa’s breath hitches and she shakes her head. Even if Liz left, their father would still be in danger. She just has to hope Max, Isobel, and Michael will show up soon to help take care of Noah.

Liz points her knife at the freezer and shakes her head. “Rosa loved her family. She would be disgusted by you. You didn’t  _ deserve _ to know her!”

Noah slams into the door and Rosa and Liz both take a step back as he yells, “ _ You _ don’t know her!”

Rosa steps forward again and yells, “Bullshit! She knows me better than you ever did!”

“She didn’t tell you her secrets, Liz. She told me,” Noah continues, and Rosa freezes, mouth open on her rebuttal. He says, “It’s true, Liz. You know she made your mother leave? She told her never to come back or she’d tell you and Arturo the truth.”

“So what if I did?” Rosa snarls at him. “So what if I made her leave before she broke Liz’s heart again?” She hears him tell Liz that Rosa wasn’t Arturo’s daughter and she shakes her head. “So what if I hadn’t found the chance to tell her every dirty little secret? It doesn’t matter, because she knew I loved her unconditionally, which is more than you will  _ ever _ be able to say about me.”

Noah yells out, “Rosa is a Valenti,” and the door to the freezer opens.

Rosa shakes her head and squares her shoulders, keeping Liz behind her. “It doesn’t matter what I confided in you because you will  _ never _ be my person, and if you kill Liz right now, I  _ swear _ , I will not stop until I find a way to kill you myself.”

Noah steps forward and Rosa backs up to Liz’s chest as he grasps Liz’s wrist and pulls the knife from it. Rosa looks up into his cold, dark eyes and doesn’t blink as he looks down at Liz and tells them Rosa belongs to him.

Liz flings curcuma into his eyes and Noah screams, swiping at the two of them with the knife as he passes by them. “I’ll never be yours!” Rosa yells after him as he takes off through the kitchen door again.

Rosa lets out a half-sob, half-relieved laugh and turns back to Liz, shaking her head in relief that they’d driven him away. She freezes when she looks down and sees Liz’s hand, covering a rapidly-spreading red stain on her white shirt. “Liz?” she whispers, cocking her head to the side.

Liz stumbles forward and Rosa reaches out for her, but she steadies herself on the counter. She grabs a towel from the stack in the kitchen and presses it to her side, whimpering as she does so.

“Liz,” Rosa says again, voice trembling. “I-I think you should call Max.”

Her sister seems to be thinking along the same lines, because she picks up her phone and stumbles back out to the diner as she dials. “He got out,” is the first thing she says to Max.

Rosa nods and presses her hands over her sister’s, trying to help stem the bleeding. She’s close enough to hear Max say, “I’m coming to you.”

She lets out a slow, relieved breath but freezes when Liz says, “No, I-I’m fine.” She then says that Noah will kill someone else to regain his strength if he’s not stopped soon, as a reason for him not to come straight to her.

“Liz!” Rosa says, straightening. “You were slashed with a knife. You need to be healed.” Her fingers itch to grab the phone from her sister’s hand and demand Max come to her immediately.

“Are you sure you’re okay, Liz?” she hears Max say on the line.

“No!” Rosa yells.

At the same time, Liz shakes her head and says, “Yes, I’m fine.”

Rosa scowls and bends down again to look at Liz’s side, checking if there’s more blood seeping from under the towel. There doesn’t seem to be, which is a good sign, but her sister is still  _ bleeding _ from being slashed at by a murderous psychopath.

Liz ends her call with Max and looks down at her side, wincing. “Fuck,” she breathes out, and Rosa nods her agreement. Liz licks her lips and takes a few slow breaths, then picks up her phone again and dials.

A few rings in they both hear Kyle pick up. “Liz?”

Rosa nods again and lets out a breath while Liz says, “I need your help. Can you come to the Crashdown?”

There’s a short pause before he says, “Of course. I’m on my way.”

“Thanks,” Liz breathes out, ending the call and stumbling behind the counter to retrieve the first aid kit. She comes back around to sit on one of the barstools and starts digging through the kit.

“Jesus,” Rosa says, collapsing on a barstool next to her and dropping her head on the counter.

/

As much as she wants to follow Noah, keep an eye on him until Max and the others catch up to him, Rosa can’t leave her sister until she knows she’s going to be okay.

Liz picks through the first aid kit, but there’s not much in there that can be used on such a large gash--it’s mostly for superficial kitchen mishaps, with the thought that other, major accidents will be taken care of at an actual hospital.

Rosa paces in front of Liz as she dabs at the wound in her side, both of them muttering in Spanish as they wait for Kyle to show up. Liz’s rant is less colorful in her rage; Rosa assumes it’s because her energy is waning and the pain in her side is too high, which means Rosa’s pacing and swearing gets even worse.

Finally, after the longest fifteen minutes of her existence, Kyle walks into the Crashdown, apologizing for taking so long. “I swear I was being followed,” he says. “I had to lose the guy. Tonight’s been hell.”

Rosa’s eyes narrow on him when he says he thinks he was being followed, but-- “First things first,” she says, pointing to Liz.

He slows down, realizing there’s something very wrong. “Liz?” he asks, then rushes forward to look at her side.

“Noah,” Liz gasps out, shifting the towel to let him see the wound a little better.

“Needle and thread,” Kyle says immediately, and Rosa lets out a relieved breath that her brother can be so level headed in a crisis situation, because she really, really can’t.

“Uh, linen closet upstairs. My mom’s old kit,” Liz says, and Kyle’s already rushing to the stairs for it. “Kyle, don’t wake my dad,” she calls after him.

Rosa throws out her arms and says, “After what happened earlier? I think it’s safe to say  _ Papi _ sleeps like the dead, Elizabeth!”

When Kyle comes back down, he’s got the sewing kit and a bottle of tequila, which he unscrews and hands over to Liz when she makes grabby hands at it. “Thank you,” she gasps out after the first sip.

He lifts his eyebrows and shakes his head, digging through the first aid kit for a pair of gloves. “You’ll need it if we’re really gonna do this  _ here _ ,” he says. There’s clearly a question in there-- _ are you sure you want to do this here? _ \--but Liz takes another sip of tequila, so he just starts cleaning up her side.

Rosa paces around the diner, arms crossed over her chest as she hugs herself, hands squeezing her arms whenever Liz whimpers in pain.

Finally, Kyle flat out says, “We should be at the hospital.”

“They’d make me answer too many questions,” Liz asserts, taking another sip as he continues to sew up her side. “I’m fine, we don’t have time for all that.”

Kyle looks up at her, brow furrowed with annoyance. “All that anesthesia. Those sanitary instruments.”

“Like you’re not the next best thing when she can’t go to a hospital,” Rosa scoffs, collapsing on the stool next to Liz.

Liz shakes her head and ignores him. “He said I didn’t know Rosa. He said she was your father’s daughter,” she says, looking at Kyle, and Kyle freezes. “And that she died knowing that, and she never told me.”

Rosa holds her breath as she looks between her two siblings; Liz searching for the truth, and Kyle guiltily bestowing it upon her.

He shakes his head and avoids Liz’s eyes as he continues sewing up her side. “M-maybe...she just couldn’t find the right time.”

Liz grips his hand, waiting until he looks up at her, and says, “You knew?” He gives a small smile and shrug and Liz gasps. “You lost a sister too,” she says.

He breaks eye contact with her and continues patching her up. “Not like you did, and I didn’t even know until a couple months ago, so it’s not the same.”

Rosa sighs and shakes her head. “No, but you still missed out on knowing I was your sister when I was alive,” she says, and then she smiles. “And I would have been a damn great big sister to you.”

“No, it’s not the same,” Liz says softly. “You missed out on her completely, and that’s another reason to be furious with Noah for taking her away from us.”

/

Liz is going to be fine, so the next problem is, once again, Noah. Rosa concentrates on him and it takes only a moment to arrive in the middle of the aliens’ cave in the turquoise mines.

Isobel is laid out on a rock, looking like Sleeping Beauty, and next to her, looking much less well cared for, is Max. He’s sprawled out, face-down in the dirt on the cave floor, looking like hell. Rosa runs over to check them over and lets out a relieved breath when she sees they’re both still breathing.

She leaves them to find out what Noah’s up to on the other side of the cave. He’s lit the heating elements on the portable stove the others had hauled out there to warm the liquid silver mixture needed to penetrate the pods’ membranes.

“Fuck,” Rosa says under her breath, looking back at Max and Isobel’s unconscious bodies. She eyes the pods, wondering where Michael is. Her eyes widen when she realizes she hasn’t checked in on him since Noah stabbed him, had just counted on Max to heal him when he’d awakened, but if he hadn’t awakened in time…

She bites her lip, looking between Max and Isobel and the rapidly warming silver mixture on the stove, wondering if she’d have time to at least check on him, know for sure--

Max jolts awake, calling out Isobel’s name, and Rosa’s decision is made for her. She has to stay with them. However this ends, she needs to be here for Max and Isobel.

“She won’t wake up for a while,” Noah says. “It’s hard on her body, being inhabited. But she likes it rough sometimes.”

Max staggers to his feet and shakes his head. “I am going to kill you,” he says.

Rosa stands next to him, snarling at Noah, and says, “Please fucking do!”

Noah waves a hand and sends Max back down to his knees, his eyes cold and ambivalent when faced with the unseen hatred in Rosa’s as she steps between him and Max.

“Why are you keeping us alive?” Max asks from behind her. “What are you leveraging us for?”

Noah turns away and continues heating up the silver, not even looking back as he answers, “The alighting. They’re coming for us, Maximo. I’d hoped we could go as a family, but...plans change.”

“What’s the alighting?” Max asks. “Who are they?”

Rosa’s brow furrows as she turns back to him. “Why does it matter?” she asks him, and she sees his eyes darting to the cave entrance. Noah’s still facing away, so he doesn’t notice, but Rosa lets out a relieved breath. “You’re stalling,” she says, darting for the cave entrance, straining to hear past the sounds of the storm that’s picking up outside. “You’re getting him to villain monologue because you know backup’s coming. Michael’s alive.” She lets out a laugh and presses her fingers to her eyes. “Oh, thank god.”

Max keeps Noah talking for the next couple of minutes while Rosa listens at the cave entrance, and they learn about how someone from their home planet is bound to come looking for Max, because he’s special. The three of them together are well worth a ride home, according to Noah. He also informs Max that he’s capable of so much more than he’s aware, likening him to a savior, a god.

Rosa rolls her eyes and shakes her head. “ _ You’re _ only that powerful because you’ve  _ killed _ . Max never would.”

Noah grows frustrated with Max’s repeated dismissals of his assertions and rushes him, yelling about who religion’s really about; aliens apparently. Rosa abandons her watch on the cave entrance and drops down next to Max, hands on Noah’s arm, trying to push him away as his hand starts glowing red on Max’s chest. “No!” she yells. “You wanted him alive, remember!”

“You’re having a heart attack,” Noah tells Max as he gasps for breath on his knees in front of him. “When they come for you, they’ll want you alive. But barely will do.”

Max takes another gasping breath, eyes wide on Noah, and then Noah’s thrown backward across the cave, hitting the back wall with a loud thud and dropping to the ground.

Rosa looks over to the entrance and lets out a hysterical laugh. “I have never been so happy to see your dumb face in my whole life, Mikey,” she says.

He rushes over to Max and kneels in front of him. “Are you okay?”

Max gasps, shaking his head. “I’m not...I’m not strong enough.”

Rosa’s smile fades and she looks around the cave. Isobel’s still passed out on the rock behind Max, and Noah’s already stirring. “What are we gonna do?” Rosa asks, a hand on each of their shoulders.

Max says, “Hold him off, Michael,” and takes off.

Rosa lets out an incoherent yell after him as she and Michael stand, turning around to face Noah, who’s standing up again. “Fuck,” she whispers, shaking out her shoulders and letting out a long breath.

Michael narrows his eyes on Noah, hand outstretched. He manages to slow him down a bit, but Noah comes at him with a lot more power and experience, easily throwing Michael into the wall. Rosa yells and runs over to check on him as Noah strides out of the cave after Max. Once she sees Michael’s still breathing, Rosa takes off after Noah.

He’s yelling something at Max across the expanse of desert between them, but the sound of the storm drowns them both out. They stop, several yards away from each other, but she keeps running for Max. When lightning shoots out of his hands towards Noah, she skids to a stop between them, blinded by the light.

Her eyes adjust and she watches a string of lightning extend from Max’s hands into Noah’s chest, shaking him as he raises him into the sky. “What the fuck,” Rosa whispers, wide eyes travelling between the two.

Noah’s yelling in pain and convulsing up in the air, and Max keeps his eyes focused on Noah, channeling more lightning into his body.

Rosa holds her breath and steps back so she can have a clear line of sight on Noah as Max channels more lightning into him. Isobel and Michael run out of the cave just as Noah stops screaming and Max lets go, dropping him to the ground.

Max, Michael, and Isobel walk slowly to his body, but Rosa runs. She drops to her knees on the ground next to him, hand hovering over the ragged lightning marks on his chest, eyes fixed on his mouth to see if he’s breathing.

When the others step closer she looks up at Max. “Is--is he dead?” she asks. She looks back down at Noah and fists both hands over his chest. She licks her lips and looks up at Max again. “Is it done?”

Isobel says, “Max?” Her voice is shaking. Michael steps closer to her and wraps an arm around her.

Max nods his head and says roughly, “He’s dead.”

Rosa lets out a loud sob, falling back onto her ass in the mud as she lifts her hands to her mouth, unable to keep the happy sobs in. She crosses her arms over her knees and buries her head in them, closing her eyes and breathing deep because her murderer is finally,  _ finally _ dead.

/

Max, Michael, and Isobel talk around and above her about what to do with Noah’s body, but it’s a faint buzzing sound in the back of Rosa’s head as she comes to grips with the fact that the person she hates most in the world is dead. The buzzing turns more persistent the longer she sits in the mud, rain continuing to fall around her. She’s confused because she’d thought with Noah’s end, she’d feel better, but there’s still a low level of dread building in her chest, the cause of which she can’t quite pinpoint. Lightning flashes across the sky and she suddenly remembers Kyle’s words from earlier in the night: “I swear I was being followed.”

“Fuck,” she says, scrambling up. She takes minimal notice of the fact that the others are gone--back into the cave, probably--before she concentrates hard on her brother. Last she’d checked, Jesse Manes was back from Niger, and he would not be happy with Kyle for siding with Alex about the aliens, or his part in Caulfield’s destruction.

When she arrives at Kyle’s side, she has to take a second to blink, eyes adjusting to the harsh overhead lights after being out in the dark for so long. He’s in a shop, standing in front of a man who’s asking him about… different types of guns?

“I just want a gun,” Kyle says tiredly.

Rosa sucks in a breath, eyebrows knitting together. “Kyle?” she asks, hand hovering over his shoulder.

The man behind the counter shrugs and gestures to the gun on the counter in front of him. “$249.99.”

Kyle swallows and looks down at the gun, eyes red. “No background check?” he asks, shifting from foot to foot and leaning on the counter. He looks...exhausted, and after the day he’s had, Rosa understands why. She doesn’t understand why he thinks he needs to buy a  _ gun _ , though.

“I’m not the kind of guy who buys a gun,” Kyle tells the man, shaking his head, and Rosa lets out a relieved breath, leaning forward to rest her head on his arm. He continues, “A few months ago I was a surgeon on my way to my high school reunion, and now I got a dead sister and a dad who was killed by his closest friend.”

Rosa sucks in a breath and leans back to look up at him. “You found out about Manes pushing Jim into the cell,” she murmurs. “Oh, Kyle.” She presses her forehead to his arm again, wrapping her hands around his arm.

Kyle scoffs and says, “And...by the way, I have this feeling that guy's following me, even though he's in friggin' Africa.”

Rosa tilts her head to look around, whispering, “Fuck.” She strays far enough away that she can look out the windows at the front of the store while still trailing her hand down Kyle’s arm, swinging back around to say, “You’re not losing it,” when he admits he thinks he is. She sighs and comes back, drifting her hands down his shoulders in comfort.

“You know, I used to be a real dick,” Kyle says to the man. “And then my dad died, and I started living by his code.” He shakes his head and grimaces. “But it turns out being a good person doesn't matter. Do no harm, they say. And then the world’s on fire and you’re sitting there with your thumb up your ass because you don’t want to do damage.”

Rosa lets out a whine and shakes her head, looking up at him and cupping his cheek in her hand. “Yes, it does. Being a good person and trying your best to do the right thing  _ matters _ .” She licks her lips and watches him contemplate buying a gun. “Sometimes...sometimes, things go wrong, and people get hurt. But… that wasn’t your fault. This isn’t you, Kyle,” she says, gesturing down to the display case.

She holds her breath while he looks over the available guns, rubbing his eyes and pacing in front of the display case. His shoulders are tense, nearly up to his ears as he eyes the gun on the counter, and then he stops, leans on the counter, and lets out a long breath.

Rosa lets out a slow breath when his shoulders drop down again while he rubs his eyes, then runs his hand through his hair. He shakes his head hard, and inhales sharply as he stands up, mouth twisting as he says, “No, I...” He rubs his eyes again and exhales slowly. “What about a vest?”

Rosa sits on the counter as they go through the transaction, face buried in her hands as she listens to the sounds of her brother trying on then buying a bulletproof vest. She mutters an equal number of swears and thanks in Spanish as she follows Kyle out to his car, sliding into the passenger seat as she eyes him. “Call Alex and tell him you think his father’s following you, and then you need to go  _ home _ , Kyle. You need to get some sleep.”

It’s nearing dawn and he’s been up for at least twenty-four hours at this point, but he doesn’t go home. He stops at the hospital and Rosa follows him in as he avoids most of the other doctors and sneaks into the pharmacy.

“Kyle?” She swallows hard, eyes wide as she watches him carefully cap and place a full syringe into his jacket pocket. Kyle’s never been one to mess around with drugs, but he’s had a hell of a day, and she knows firsthand they are both more susceptible to addiction than most. “What are you doing?”

Of course he doesn’t answer, so she follows him back to his car and eyes him from the passenger seat as he makes his way back to the Project Shepherd bunker.

“No,” she says firmly, shaking her head at him as he puts his car into park. “You need to  _ sleep _ , Kyle. You need rest, and backup, and to  _ not _ be here right now, reliving the worst things our father did.”

But he doesn’t listen. He goes inside to review more of the Caulfield drives, and she follows him. He hasn’t called Alex, or anyone else to let them know he’s being followed, and he’s dead on his feet. He needs someone to watch his back if Manes is back in town and gunning for him.

Rosa paces around the table, then on top of it as Kyle goes through the hard drives. She finally lays down on top of the table, draping her arm over her eyes and telling Kyle, “You know, I could be at the Pony right now, celebrating the death of my murderer with Maria, or with my sister as she finds out Noah’s finally dead, but no. I’m here with you, my dumbass brother, as you look through more of this Project Shepherd stuff instead of going home to  _ sleep _ like a--”

She jolts up, a shiver travelling down her spine as Manes creeps past her at the table, gun drawn low in front of him. “Kyle!” she yells out, scrambling across the table toward him.

Kyle turns around and says, “I knew you were gonna--”

Manes doesn’t even let him finish; he shoots Kyle in the chest, and Kyle flies back into the computer terminals. Rosa shrieks as she slides off the end of the table, scrambling forward to check on her brother.

“Say hello to Jim for me, son,” Manes drawls out from behind her, and Rosa has to bite back her growl as she hovers over Kyle, watching his mouth to check on his breathing and praying Manes had hit him in the vest.

Kyle twists to the side, mouth open in a silent scream of pain, hand hovering over the spot on his chest where the bullet had impacted.

“Oh thank God,” Rosa breathes out, standing up with him as he creeps up behind Manes, picking up a statue from the table and swinging it at the bastard’s head.

Manes goes down hard and Kyle picks up his gun, holding it on Manes as he gets back up and says, “Bulletproof vest, huh? Nicely done.” He drops into a chair at the table.

“I wanted to buy a gun,” Kyle responds, shaking his head. “But I couldn’t do it. I’m not  _ like _ you. I’m not a  _ killer _ .” His hand wavers as he keeps the gun trained on Manes, and Rosa walks up next to him, placing her hand on his arm, wanting to help steady him.

“Oh, so you...you know about your dad,” Manes says mildly.

Rosa turns back to him and snarls, “Shut the fuck up.”

He continues, “An alien killed his daughter, and he still wanted to shut Caulfield down.”

“The alien that killed Rosa wasn’t in your torture chamber!” Kyle yells at him, aim steadying as he steps closer. “You tried to cover up the kills.”

“And your dad conducted the cover-ups. I wanted them exposed,” Manes explains, turning to pour himself a drink at the table. “I wanted the American people to arm--”

Rosa jumps when Kyle lunges forward, jamming the needle from his pocket into Manes’ neck, depressing the syringe and stepping back again before she could fully comprehend what happened.

“Barbiturates,” Kyle says, stepping further away and storing the gun in the back of his jeans. “You’re about to enter a medically-induced coma, Master Sergeant.”

Rosa’s eyebrows fly up and she looks her brother up and down, impressed. “Wow. I really didn’t think you were coherent enough for such a well-thought-out scheme right now.”

“Don't worry. I'll get you to the hospital before any of your vital organs shut down,” Kyle continues as Manes falls back to the ground. He stalks forward, standing over him as he says, “I hope your doctor's a real man of honor. Someone with a code. Though, I suppose, it depends on what their version of honor is. One nation's soldier is another's terrorist. Isn't that right, Master Sergeant?”

Rosa stands over Manes, next to her brother, as they watch their father’s murderer fall into a coma. Kyle’s breath starts coming in harsh pants as the adrenaline from getting shot and the confrontation with Manes leaves his system. Rosa wraps her arms around him and looks up into his eyes. “You were protecting yourself,” she tells him as he looks down at Manes. “He was going to kill you, and you fought back in a much less lethal way. You don’t have to feel guilty about this, I promise.”

/

When Kyle seems more steady, like he knows what he needs to do to take care of the Jesse Manes issue, Rosa leaves to find Liz.

She’s at the Crashdown with their dad. They’re smiling at each other over churro pancakes in the back booth, the one she and Liz always used to to their homework in when they were little. The one they’d not so secretly scratched their initials into the summer before Rosa started middle school and they were going to be at separate schools for the first time ever. Their booth.

“What’s the occasion,  _ mija _ ?” their dad asks Liz as Rosa slides into the booth next to him.

Liz smiles and shrugs, scooping up a piece of pancake and swirling it around the syrup on her plate. “I don’t know. I’m just...happy, I guess?” She shoves her food into her mouth and shrugs again. She’s practically glowing with happiness.

Rosa laughs and says, “Oh my god, you totally banged Max Evans, didn’t you?”

Their dad chuckles and shakes his head. “Any particular reason why?” he asks, eyes narrowed on Liz.

She fights a grin and narrows her eyes in return. “Maybe?” She laughs and shakes her head. “I don’t know, a lot’s happened these last couple of weeks.”

Rosa sighs as she drops her head onto the table, looking up at her dad. The crinkles next to his eyes deepen as he smiles at Liz and starts teasing her about Max. Rosa sits there and just listens to the sound of their voices for a few minutes, closes her eyes and thinks back to her childhood. Sitting in this booth with Liz as they sped through their homework to go back out and play with Maria and Alex. Dancing with Liz after closing as they cleaned up the diner, trying to out-sing each other to their favorite songs on the jukebox. Back when things were simple, and she was still happy, and alive.

There’s a change in the air now, she can feel it, just like there was more than ten years ago when Noah came striding into her life pretending to be Isobel Evans, her new friend. Back then, she hadn’t cared that the feeling of change had seemed dark, foreboding. She had been angry all the time, felt stifled by her life in this small town, aching to be free, no matter what the cost.

Now, it’s different. Her murderer’s been unmasked and killed, and the only other threat to her loved ones has just been put into a coma by her brilliant brother. There’s the rest of Project Shepherd to shut down, but the group of them, working together? They can take care of that no problem. It just feels like everything Rosa was most worried about when it comes to the safety of her family has been taken care of.

“Maybe you don’t need me so much anymore,” she murmurs, sitting up and looking across the booth at her sister. “And maybe...maybe I’m okay with letting you go now. Just a little bit.” After all, there’s no need to stalk her sister everywhere when she knows she’s safe, right? Same for her brother and her friends.

“I’m gonna go see Rosa,” Liz says as breakfast is winding down. “I need to...talk to her about some things.” She narrows her eyes as she says it, as if wondering if that’s the best way to phrase it. “Do you want to come?”

Their dad laughs and shakes his head. “No,  _ mija _ . I talked to her already this morning,” he says, tilting his head toward the kitchen, and Rosa’s memorial. “But it sounds like you have a lot to tell her. I’ll clean this up, you go on.” He starts cleaning up their dishes, lifting his cheek for a kiss and Liz leans over the booth.

“Love you,  _ Papi _ . I’ll tell her you said hello,” Liz says, scooting out of the booth and heading for the door. 

Rosa ghosts her lips over the same cheek and says, “Love you too,  _ Papi _ ,” before she follows her sister out to her car.

/

The drive out to the graveyard is quiet. Liz has turned the radio down low, opting to open her window and hang her arm out, hand waving up and down with the motion of the wind. Rosa sits in the passenger seat, a small smile gracing her face as she watches her sister. “You and the Pod Squad are safe from Noah, and Kyle and Alex are safe from his father,” she murmurs, tilting her head to rest on the passenger window. “It’s a good day.”

Liz takes a second after she parks to look over in the direction of Rosa’s grave, breathing deep. Rosa places her hand over Liz’s on the steering wheel and squeezes gently. Liz wipes her hands on her jeans before she grabs the single rose she’d picked up from the store and gets out of the car, making her way to Rosa’s grave. Rosa keeps pace with her and they stop to look down at her gravestone.

They’re both quiet for a long moment before Liz starts talking to her. “If you can, uh, hear me… you probably know I don’t believe you can actually hear me,” she says. “And I think I’m an idiot for talking to a rock.”

Rosa smiles and shakes her head, nose scrunching up as she says, “Yeah, but deep down I think you wish I could, which is why you’re here.”

“But you believed in something,” Liz continues, fingers twirling the rose in her hand. “You believed in a God who put a cage around your heart to protect it, so here I am.” Rosa sighs and shakes her head, then bites her lip when Liz continues by saying, “I’m in love with Max Evans.”

Rosa smiles. “I’m happy to hear it. I think he’s worth the risk.”

Liz rolls her eyes and says, “I never said it. Probably ‘cause a tiny, 17-year-old piece of me thought you might hear it.”

Rosa sighs again and wishes she hadn’t been so adamant about Liz protecting her heart from Max back in high school. “There are some people you need to protect your heart from, like Mom, or who I thought Isobel was when I said those things. But not Max,” she murmurs, resting her hand on Liz’s shoulder.

“I haven’t forgotten what he did to you,” Liz continues. “And I felt so  _ guilty _ ...for loving him. But I do…love him. And he loves me.” She closes her eyes and smiles.

Rosa squeezes Liz’s shoulder and shakes her head. “You don’t have to feel guilty for loving him. I forgave him a long time ago, once I learned what really happened that night, and I need  _ you _ not to worry so much about what a dead woman thinks.”

“I wish you had the chance to have someone love you, Rosa, purely, without expectation or entitlement,” Liz says.

Rosa smiles, feeling a happy jolt go through her at that. She shrugs and says, “Maybe I wished for that too, and regret, just a little, never having a chance at love, but these last ten years?” She licks her lips and says, “I’ve still had the chance to become someone…different than I was, and I don’t hate that.” Rosa feels the happiness and joy at the realization that she actually  _ likes _ who she is now spread through her.

“I wish you had time to let...your heart out of its cage,” Liz says. Rosa’s smile widens and she trails her fingers down to press over Liz’s as she continues with a laugh, “And I wish...Oh… I wish I could just...call you, and tell you everything, but--”

There’s a hitch in Rosa’s chest and she and Liz gasp at the same time, hands rising to press on their hearts in tandem. “Max,” Liz breathes out.

Liz drops the rose on top of Rosa’s grave and bolts for her car, while Rosa closes her eyes and concentrates on getting to Max.

/

He’s in Noah’s cave. Rosa’s breath hitches when she realizes he’s pulled her body from Noah’s pod, covered her with a blanket, and started...trying to heal her?

She stands above him for a moment, brain struggling to comprehend what she’s seeing, but when he yells and his hand glows red, another jolt goes through her incorporeal form and she drops to her knees beside him. “Max?” she asks, one hand hovering over his shoulder, the other hovering over her body.

There’s sweat dripping from his forehead and he grits his teeth as he pushes more of his healing power into her body. “You tried this ten years ago and it didn’t work, remember?” she says, shaking her head. She tries to keep her eyes on him and away from her charred body, but her eyes drift down and she sees the burns starting to disappear. Her breath hitches and her eyes jerk back up to him. “Can you actually do this?” she whispers, eyes wide.

Max’s yells get louder as he pushes more of his healing power into her body and she feels that high again, the same one she’d felt more than ten years ago when he’d tried to heal her and failed. It’s been a while since she’s gotten high, but this feeling… She lets out a slow breath and shakes her head, a shiver travelling down her spine. She feels... _ incredible _ .

This might actually work.

She opens her eyes on a smile--she hadn’t even realized they’d drifted shut--and looks over at Max, a giddy feeling spreading through her chest. Her smile starts to fade when she sees how...pale he is, all color drained from his cheeks, and just...covered in sweat. He really does not look well.

“Max?” she says, reaching over to cup his cheek.

His voice is hoarse from yelling, but he continues.

Rosa feels another jolt go through her and Max gasps for air as he gears up to press more healing power into her body. “Stop!” she yells, jerking away from him. “Max, you have to stop!”

But he doesn’t. He leans further over her, hand glowing red hot as he screams himself hoarse pushing his healing power into her body.

“Think about Isobel and Michael,” she yells down at him, licking her lips. “Think about  _ Liz _ ! I’m dead, I’ve  _ been _ dead! I’ve already left her, you can’t leave her too!” She drops back down to her knees and presses both her hands to his shoulders, trying with all her might to  _ push him away _ from her body, but she can’t. She’s screaming, and Max is screaming, and she thinks she feels her heart beat and she yells, “Max,  _ please _ , you have to st--”

There’s a flash of white light, and the screaming stops.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm on tumblr as islndgurl777 if you want to hmu about RNM!


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